The Pharaoh, Exodus, God, and the Meme that started an argument

[Bengalzona]

(09-21-2016, 12:35 PM)GMDino Wrote: Is it?  I'd agree once we are "of age" but I didn't have a choice when I was a child.  I was taken to church, sent to Catholic school, etc.

So was my mother.  (My dad converted to marry her.)

So were her parents.

So were my kids.  Although I did raise them to question things more than I was raised to.  Both are non-religious.  My daughter is pretty much straight up atheist at 18.

Yet now that I am older and a doubter those same religious people tell me I should have "faith" when they directly forced it into me to being with. (Not a pedophile priest joke.)

What you describe is religious indoctrination. But religious indoctrination is different than actual faith. Even when someone has been indoctrinated by a religion, there still comes a point where they are compelled within to decide "Am I going to believe this?". They have to make a choice. Indoctrination may influence that choice, but the choice is always there. Someone may outwardly appear to 'go along' with a religion, but no human knows their inner thoughts. A human soul will always be free, even if the person is not. You are living proof of that, my friend.

This hits upon a couple things that I think are widely misunderstood (and abused):
1) You cannot force/coerce/manipulate people into believing something. You can force them to pretend to believe something, to 'play the part'.
2) Faith is a personal thing. It is not a group thing. Religion is a group thing. But not everyone within a religion has faith (i.e. actually believes what the religion ascribes itself to).