Time to resurrect this thread.
Skimmed through half of the posts, everyone posted here either Christian or ex-Christian I think. Surprisingly everyone was mature. I hope it will remain mature whether you're
Jew,
Christian,
Muslim or
Atheist. So I will share some thoughts of mine as an ex-Muslim, maybe it can give more insight to irreligious people here and maybe Christians here can view it more objectively because it's not their religion. I won't go showing contradicting verses etc. I will try to approach directly to big topics.
Before I start, I don't have any problem with all Muslims, because there are a lot good Muslims. But I have problems with Islam. I believe almost all good Muslims would still be good people if they weren't Muslim, but there are a lot bad people that is bad because they're corrupted from certain aspects of Islam as a religion and culture. I might become harsh, so if you're Muslim and easily angered, perhaps just stop reading.
I am an apatheist. Agnostic apatheist to be exact. With our current knowledge, we seem pretty far from answer whether God exists or not, and to be fair existence of a God or a Godless universe won't have any impact on my daily life. I will just try to be a good person as much as I can and try to live a decent life. Some religious people would say I will go to hell if I won't be a believer. But if I be a good person and I will still go to hell because because I am not a believer, how could you expect me to believe such a God? And if I still go to heaven without believing in God, then what's the point? One of the reasons I left religion. To quote from Marcus Aurelius: "Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones."
The reason I gave above also applies to other way around. Quran mentions non-Muslims will not be welcomed to Heaven. So it means y'all won't be allowed. So how could I believe in a religion that won't accept my good friends here?
Islam being not tolerant to non-heterosexual people is also another reason. For me any sexual relationship is fine as long as all involved people are consenting adults, or if they're younger than 18 their partner being at similar age. Because adult - below 18 relationship is just child abuse. And since it's hinted that
Prophet Muhammad engaged in a sexual relationship with a prepubescent girl, this was another reason for me to leave religion. Some Muslim scholars tries to justifies pedophile with this. Obviously f@#! those guys. Some scholars would deny this ever happened. And some scholars would say back then it was considered normal and by time passes norms changed. This raises two questions. 1) We know how clearly wrong pedophilia is. A child can't consent and you pretty much ruin their childhood by having sex with them. Question is, how God didn't know? Why God did not warn Muhammad? 2) You accept norms changed for this. Why can't you accept norms changed for LGBT community? Not to mention, it happens between two consenting adults. People say it's not natural. By natural I guess they mean because reproduction is not possible. Well I don't think reproduction is possible with a prepubescent girl too, right? If you mean same sex relationship doesn't happen in animal kingdom, you're wrong. You know what's natural? Dolphins f@#!ing other male dolphins' blowhole(a literal blowjob LMAO), dolphins engaging in gang rape, or dolphins biting a fish's head off and using its dead body to masturbate. Dolphins are pretty much assholes, how people find them cute?
Another topic is
mandatory systemical rituals. Christians have going to church on Sunday, Muslims have 5 daily prayers. God is mentioned as an omni-everything being, so obviously God doesn't need those prayers, but people need it according to religion. If a God created me, I am more than glad because I existed thanks to God. But why I have to perform five prayers everyday? More importantly why is it mandatory? Doesn't that inner gladness more than enough for that? An irreligious perspective would say there are these systemical prayers because to make a bigger bond with religion, making that religion a bigger part of people's life so people won't leave religion easily. If there was something like "if you wanna show your gratitude to Allah, help your fellow men in worse conditions so they can enjoy and appreciate life like you." it would make more sense imo.
Another topic is afterlife. Why there's Hell? Why God needs to punish people. You might say then what, everyone should be allowed in a heaven? Yes. Yes even those f@#!ed up ones you're currently thinking. I want to ask, how someone can go bad? 1) Traumatic experience. If you didn't have that experience, maybe you would still remain as a good person. 2) Getting corrupted. Like how they manage to convince a person to be a suicide bomber with shits like greater good, fighting for a cause, rewarded in afterlife etc. 3) You're being f@#!ed up since the beginning. Like due to some biological, psychiatrical conditions, disorders you have. Like a sociopath killing someone without feeling guilty. So, 1 and 2 could be prevented by simply not experiencing those things. There are a lot good people with very good life, but they might go bad if unfortunate things happened to them. For 3, if they didn't have those conditions or disorders, they might be good people. Of course, some still don't go bad even after these, but that's not the point. My point is if those people didn't have one of those 3 things, they could go to heaven. So instead punishing those people with eternal torment, making them understand and truly regret and then proceed them to heaven sounds more like a God to me. God should be full of
love and kindness not with anger and wrath.
Some people say if there's God, why there's evil in this world. I find this statement kinda stupid, it's the human doing those evil things not God. It is as stupid as blaming devil for the evil. If there's God, I would see this world is a place as we to form a personality etc. before moving on to heaven. With all good and bad experiences, you become who you are. And I think without bad things, we wouldn't appreciate good things. And if there's a heaven, I don't think it's a single place. I don't think there can be a single place perfect for everyone ever. I think people would have their own personal heavens. At first I thought like, so everyone in heaven is actually would be alone? That's kinda sad. But then when I thought again, for example if you have dead friend or family member, does that mean they're completely gone? No their influence on you will be with you always. Same stuff for everyone being in their personal heaven. Because wine rivers etc. sounds too cheesy to live for an eternity.
Sorry for long post.
Hope I didn't bore you with my nonsense.