Believing in a big man who rules over all, but is never seen and allows awful things to happen sometimes, but averts them sometimes is much weirder than not believing in a system to organize it all

Religion is something entirely different from faith in my opinion.
I believe religion is a pattern of what a person does in their life, in regards to God.
Faith is a changing, growing thing. As I see God working in my life, using even the bad to save his people, that faith grows.
Faith is singing a song with all your heart and knowing there is something more or being completely content with your life when not everything is going right, simply because you know your LORD is in control.
You may despise religion, but don't make it religion... make it a relationship with God. I'm not saying that church is useless... far from it... the fellowship of God's people helps grow their faith.

to me,your belief system should be that of your own personal spiritual experiences...essences...wrongs that were made right,and knowing that the next time you do them,then youre the one responsible for all the consequences,and not wanting to ever do them again....thats my answer.and no,its ok to hate religion,because to me,religion is made up of mans own rules,not Gods....what kind of God would allow they're child to go to hell?????what kind of God would stop you from making the mistakes that youre inteded to make,correct and move on,and learn from????we all must go thru hardships here,and for the Creator to jump in and stop us,it would be like knocking your child out from studying an exam...you are allowed to be honest with yourself....and hating religion is ok....everybody is at differnt levels of their spirituality...

some will criticize you,and some will agree....but the ones who criticize,they too are at a different level of understanding...so be honest with yourself...it makes for a bigger person!!

theres no one that think the same as you
groups cant be like you
you have beliefs and theres a conection between

I think you believe in God and religion. You actually despise certain people's imperfect following/ practising of religion.

Go ahead and make the difference. Fellowship with Jesus and have a real living relationship with the Father through the Holy Spirit and by reading the Holy Bible and living a godly life in EACH and EVERY AREA of your life. Don't compartmentalise God... and He will reward you many times over. Discern what God wants you to do for Him. When you reach the level where your greatest joy is to hear His voice and do His will for your life, nothing else will really matter!

I feel similar. I have seen that religion causes pain and suffering constantly, from the muslim jewish conflicts, to the priest scandals. Organized religion will hopefully eventually die out, or at least decrease, and people will be free to explore their spirituality their own way from an internal source, not an external one. Belief or faith in God is one thing, believing what an organized group of people say about God is another. Listen to what you feel internally, don't listen to what man says about God.

Today, it almost feels that people will think your crazy to believe in God if your not a Christian. Christianity is a view of God by man. God is like a computer programmer, he creates the world the way he wants it to be and starts it up, but then rarely interferes. It is possible for one to believe in God or an afterlife without believing in both, as it is also possible to believe in God but not religion. You are saying you are spiritual; spirituality is what you believe and your faith, religion is a group of people that are supposed to believe the same thing as you, as well as telling you what to believe. Believe what you want, not what man or religions tell you to.