Religions appeared a long time ago, but even earlier people began to believe in various deities and the paranormal. Belief in such things and interest in life after death appeared when people became people: with their own feelings, thoughts, social institutions and bitterness over the loss of loved ones.
Paganism and totemism appeared first, then world religions were formed, behind almost each of which there is a great creator - God in different understandings and ideas depending on faith. Moreover, each person imagines it differently. What is God? No one can answer this for sure.
Let's look at the question of why people believe in God below in the article.
What does religion give?
There are different situations in a person's life. Someone is born into a very religious family, so they also become the same. And some experience loneliness or find themselves in such random dangerous situations, after which they survive and after that begin to believe in God. But the examples don't end there. There are many reasons and explanations for why people believe in God.
The power of faith in God sometimes knows no bounds and can really be beneficial. A person receives a charge of optimism and hope when he believes, prays, etc., which has a beneficial effect on the psyche, mood and body.
Explanation of the laws of nature and everything unknown
What is God for people of the past? Faith then played a key role in people's lives. There were very few who were atheists. Moreover, the denial of God was condemned. Civilizations were not advanced enough to explain physical phenomena. And that is why people believed in deities responsible for various phenomena. For example, the ancient Egyptians had the god of air Amon, who was later responsible for the sun; Anubis patronized the world of the dead and so on. This was not only the case in Egypt. It was customary to praise the gods in Ancient Greece and Rome; even before civilizations as such, people believed in deities.
Of course, over time, discoveries occurred. They discovered that the earth is round, that there is vast space, and much more. It is worth considering that faith has nothing to do with a person’s mind. Many scientists, discoverers, and inventors were believers.
Nevertheless, even now, answers to some main questions have not been found, such as: what awaits us after death and what happened before the formation of the Earth and space as a whole? There is a theory of the Big Bang, but it has not been proven whether it actually happened, what happened before it, what caused the explosion, and more. It is unknown whether there is a soul, reincarnation, etc. Just like it has not been proven for sure that there is absolute and complete death. There are a lot of disputes on this basis in the world, but this uncertainty and unknown cannot be avoided, and religions provide answers to these eternal questions.
Believers' reaction
Adherents of the biblical picture of the world ignored the discovery of these remains and tried to deny their significance in evolution, saying that these were only a people who lived a couple of thousand years ago in Europe, and the bones of ancient animals turned out to be near them by chance. A number of others argued that they were apes similar to humans. The position of believers was also precarious due to the fact that, according to the Bible, the world was created just 5000 years before the birth of Jesus Christ. And it made absolutely no mention of the evolution and development of the human species. More and more people did not want to believe in God.
Environment, geography
As a rule, a person born into a religious family also becomes a believer. And the geographical place of birth influences what faith he will adhere to. For example, Islam is widespread in the Middle East (Afghanistan, Kyrgyzstan, etc.) and in northern Africa (Egypt, Morocco, Libya). But Christianity with all its branches is widespread in almost all of Europe, North America (Catholicism and Protestantism) and in Russia (Orthodoxy). That is why in a purely Muslim country, for example, almost all of the believers are Muslims.
Geography and family usually influence whether a person becomes religious at all, but there are a number of other reasons why people believe in God later in life.
Loneliness
Faith in God often gives people some kind of moral support from above. Lonely people have a slightly higher need for this than people who have loved ones. This is the reason that can influence the acquisition of faith, although before that a person could be an atheist.
Any religion has such a property that its adherents feel involved in something global, great, sacred. It can also give confidence in the future. It is worth noting that confident people are less dependent on the need to believe than insecure people.
Does believing in God make people happy?
One of the questions that ardent minds are raising concerns the relationship between faith and well-being. A number of studies report that among a control group of more than 160,000 Europeans, 85% of those who regularly go to church confidently said they were “very satisfied with their lives.” At that time, the percentage was slightly lower among atheists - 77%. Psychologists insist on three factors why this happens:
- social support. Faith is not individual and implies integration into groups of practitioners who provide each other with psychological and material assistance;
- finding the purpose of existence. The level of happiness and well-being increases when a person understands why he lives and what he strives for;
- feeling of emotional unity. Communication with God brings a person a sense of satisfaction and increases his personal significance.
Some cases
As mentioned above, a person can suddenly believe in God. This often happens after completely extraordinary life events. After the loss of a loved one or illness, for example.
There are cases when people suddenly think about God when they come face to face with danger, after which they were lucky: with a wild animal, with a criminal, with an injury. Faith as a guarantee that everything will be fine.
Fear of death
People are afraid of many things. Death is something that awaits everyone, but usually no one is prepared for it. It happens at an unexpected moment and makes all loved ones grieve. Some people perceive this ending with optimism, while others do not, but nevertheless it is always very uncertain. Who knows what is there on the other side of life? Of course, we want to hope for the best, and religions provide this hope.
In Christianity, for example, after death comes hell or heaven, in Buddhism - reincarnation, which is also not an absolute end. Belief in the soul also implies immortality.
We have discussed some of the reasons above. Of course, one should not discount the fact that faith can be groundless.
Why do some believe and others not?
Estimated reading time: 5 min.
The first Sunday after Easter in the language of the church charter is called the Sunday of Thomas, or the Apostle Thomas. On this day, the Gospel is read in churches about how the Risen Savior appeared to the holy apostles. But Thomas was not among them at that moment. When the apostles told him what had happened, Thomas replied: Unless I see the marks of the nails in His hands, and put my finger into the marks of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe
(In
20
:25).
People have been saying this “I won’t believe it” throughout all the times that separate us from the event of the Resurrection. Some accept the news of the Resurrection with an open heart and joy, others say: “I don’t believe it. Because this does not fit into my consciousness, does not correspond to the logic of life known to me. I don’t believe it because I can’t check and have no evidence.”
What is faith? The Apostle Paul answers this question: Now faith is the substance of things hoped for and the evidence of things not seen.
(Eur
11
:1).
The outstanding Russian theologian of the 19th century, Saint Philaret of Moscow, puts it this way: “Faith is confidence in the invisible as if in the visible. And in the desired and expected - as if in the present.”
Faith is different from knowledge. A person's knowledge is based on his experience and senses. And therefore a visible object is an object of knowledge, not faith. The heard word is also not an object of faith, but becomes an object of knowledge. Faith is confidence in the existence of that which cannot be perceived by our physical senses.
In his Catechism, Saint Philaret of Moscow notes that faith begins in the mind, although it belongs to the heart. Indeed, faith can be based on logical thinking. For example, from a logical point of view, it is much easier for me to admit that the beginning of the existence of the Universe is Reason. I cannot believe that at the basis of a harmonious and beautiful world lies an irrational principle, some ever-changing matter capable of transforming itself from simple to complex, from inanimate to living, from irrational to rational. My logic excludes belief in such an origin of the world. And this happens at the level of thinking.
A person is able to logically come to the idea of God, to discover the Creator, but this discovery will not yet be faith. The idea of God that has arisen in consciousness must cause a change of spirit and take root in the human soul not only at the level of the mind, but also in the heart. Faith is a special state of the soul. It belongs to the inner spiritual life of man, to the human heart.
It is generally accepted in theology that there is a religious feeling in every person. Religious feeling is inherent in human nature, just like, for example, an ear for music. Every person has this feeling. When the religious feeling in him is warmed up, when it is active, then a person believes, but when it remains inactive, he does not believe.
Even if a person denies religious faith in principle, the religious feeling in him still does not disappear. It’s just that in this case, he, voluntarily or unwittingly, creates for himself some kind of substitute object of faith, creates false gods, idols, which he worships, believes in and serves almost religiously. In the past, for example, such an object of faith for many people was ideology with its ideal of a “bright future.” And now life offers many examples of how people, with almost religious zeal, devote themselves to one or another idea, be it political or national, or with no less enthusiasm serve their own lust for power, consumerism, and other vices, creating idols for themselves in the form of money, things, authorities.
And now the most important question: why do some believe and others not? Unbelieving people often make excuses by saying that “this is not given to them.” Is that really true?
Under the influence of atheism, for many years the idea of God, and even more so religious faith, was arbitrarily made dependent on knowledge, and in particular on the successes of natural science. It was assumed that scientific achievements, widely propagated through the educational system, were capable of completely crowding out religious feelings from human life. However, it turned out to be impossible to defeat him not only with compulsory atheistic education, but even with persecution. For the presence or absence of faith does not depend either on scientific achievements or on the level of education. The question of the existence of God lies outside the purview of science. It is impossible to scientifically prove or disprove the existence of God. For this is an object of faith.
Here it should be said about some conditions under which a person can develop a religious feeling and gain the power of faith. Let us again turn to the analogy with an ear for music, which every person has to one degree or another. Even someone who is said to have “a bear stepped on his ear” is capable, under certain conditions, of developing an elementary ear for music and learning to feel musical harmony. Imagine two people with the same musical abilities, one of whom studies music, develops these abilities, and the other works in a forge, where it is not only impossible to develop an ear for music, but it is difficult to maintain a normal one. What will happen as a result? A person who improves his musical abilities will achieve success, but someone who works in a forge is unlikely to become a musician.
So, there are certain spiritual and moral conditions for the development of religious feeling. First of all, this is the purity of a person’s mind, soul and heart. Blessed are the pure in heart, for they will see God,
- says the Word of God (Matthew
5
:8). And the Monk Isaac the Syrian writes: “Faith requires a pure and simple way of thinking.” Divine wisdom cannot enter into an evil soul, into an unclean mind, into a heart defiled by sin; light will never mix with darkness, purity with dirt. An unclouded moral sense, that is, the ability to distinguish good from evil and subordinate one’s life to truth, is an indispensable condition for the knowledge of God. “Like is known by like,” the ancients said. If we live in lies and filth, then we will not see God, we will not feel Him with our hearts, we will not touch Him with our minds. f.
An excerpt from the book of Patriarch Kirill “The Word of the Shepherd. God and man. The story of salvation."
The title was given by the editors
Outside opinion
Many psychologists and scientists suggest that it does not matter whether God really exists, but what matters is what religion gives to each person. For example, American professor Stephen Rice conducted an interesting study where he interviewed several thousand believers. The survey revealed what beliefs they adhere to, as well as character traits, self-esteem and much more. It turned out that, for example, peace-loving people prefer a good God (or try to see him that way), but those who think that they sin a lot, repent and worry about this, prefer a strict God in a religion where there is fear punishments for sins after death (Christianity).
The professor also believes that religion provides support, love, order, spirituality, and glory. God is like some kind of invisible friend who will support in time or, on the contrary, scold, if this is necessary for a person who lacks concentration and motivation in life. Of course, this all applies more to people who need to feel some kind of support under them. And religion can provide this, as well as the satisfaction of human basic feelings and needs.
But scientists from Oxford and Coventry University tried to identify the connection between religiosity and analytical/intuitive thinking. It would seem that the more analyticalism a person has, the higher the likelihood that he is an atheist. However, the results showed that there is no connection between the type of thinking and religiosity. Thus, we found out that the inclination to believe in a person is determined rather by upbringing, society, environment, but is not given from birth and does not arise just like that.
Psychology
Another argument in favor of not believing in God is the following position.
The whole point is that religion, from childhood, shapes a person’s thinking in a certain way so that he is convenient for management. Anyone who believes is afraid of his natural needs, afraid of everything around him. He doesn’t value his life because he believes in the next one, which means he won’t fight for anything in this one. All this also turns beliefs into convenient means of manipulation for those in power.
Those who act on the principle “I don’t believe in God, but I’m afraid of him” put fear at the forefront of their lives. A person thinks the same way in all spheres of life, and begins to act one way or another, fearing the boss and other people in power. Such a person will not become strong, he will not be able to become a threat to power. Just as someone who constantly repents and looks for his sins and defects in everything will not become one. He is humility, which is so convenient for those who want to live beautifully in this life. The whole system is built on using others in a way that they don't understand.
