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Do we have Autistics and Aspies here who are newly religious

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emax10000
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29 Jan 2015, 12:48 am

To introduce more about myself, I am someone who is on the Autism Spectrum who for the first 27 years of my life was in denial that I had any problems at all and it was a disaster. Hopefully as I participate more I can get confident enough to share more about this - unfortunately I admit I am a long way from divulging all the details of these experiences now.

I am also someone who has recently been turning to religious guidance on a personal, i.e. not doctrinal level, to help me deal with it particularly since I am in a situation where I am now just starting to learn how to deal with it after years of trying to force myself to ignore it.

I also know that among many in the Autistic/Aspie community there seems to be a sort of hostility to religious beliefs or indeed spiritual beliefs of any kind among some of the members - not all of them of course. I often get the impression that public figured such as Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens are very popular among some segments of this community.

So I was wondering if there are other Aspies and Autistics here who are not anti theists like them and in addition have found that looking to spiritual, heaven based guidance as also assisted them in dealing with problems that they may have struggled with before. I would love to have outreach with those members here.



coschristi
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03 Feb 2015, 3:09 am

I haven't decided yet. more honestly, I should say I struggle with it. I have a science-minded brain but it seems the more I learn, the less I think current science knows. I have hyperlexia, which last month enabled me to read the entire bible in 5 nights. I have a hunch that much was lost in translation. I do, however, find a deep magic in the directive "do unto others as you would have them do to you". I'm sure that no matter who you are or what planet you are from, following that can't lead you astray.



Moromillas
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04 Feb 2015, 7:14 pm

emax10000 wrote:
I also know that among many in the Autistic/Aspie community there seems to be a sort of hostility to religious beliefs or indeed spiritual beliefs of any kind among some of the members - not all of them of course. I often get the impression that public figured such as Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens are very popular among some segments of this community.

This is plainly false. My Dad is religious and I'm sure everyone knows someone that is. It's not religiosity, or religious people that others have an issue with, it's that those beliefs impacts the lives of others, in bad ways.

Also, there does appear to be an overlap, between religiosity and anti-vaxxers, and also between religiosity and supporting eugenic elimination. That's because within religion, there is a rejection of science, and scientific facts, therefore they can easily believe that we're not valuable, but rather diseased or defective.

To my surprise, Pope Francis actually came out in support of eugenic elimination, and before that I thought of him as the nicest Pope I've seen so far.



coschristi wrote:
I have hyperlexia, which last month enabled me to read the entire bible in 5 nights. I have a hunch that much was lost in translation.

That's because that book is so heavily edited, that's why it seems very odd. It was actually polytheism with these gods that were very different from each other, a long time ago.



Ganondox
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05 Feb 2015, 1:30 am

Moromillas wrote:
emax10000 wrote:
I also know that among many in the Autistic/Aspie community there seems to be a sort of hostility to religious beliefs or indeed spiritual beliefs of any kind among some of the members - not all of them of course. I often get the impression that public figured such as Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens are very popular among some segments of this community.

This is plainly false.


Says the guy expressing hostility to religious beliefs or spiritual views.


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Moromillas
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05 Feb 2015, 1:35 am

Ganondox wrote:
Moromillas wrote:
emax10000 wrote:
I also know that among many in the Autistic/Aspie community there seems to be a sort of hostility to religious beliefs or indeed spiritual beliefs of any kind among some of the members - not all of them of course. I often get the impression that public figured such as Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens are very popular among some segments of this community.

This is plainly false.


Says the guy expressing hostility to religious beliefs or spiritual views.


You do realise that people can read the post above and see that you're lying, right?



pcuser
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05 Feb 2015, 4:56 pm

emax10000 wrote:
To introduce more about myself, I am someone who is on the Autism Spectrum who for the first 27 years of my life was in denial that I had any problems at all and it was a disaster. Hopefully as I participate more I can get confident enough to share more about this - unfortunately I admit I am a long way from divulging all the details of these experiences now.

I am also someone who has recently been turning to religious guidance on a personal, i.e. not doctrinal level, to help me deal with it particularly since I am in a situation where I am now just starting to learn how to deal with it after years of trying to force myself to ignore it.

I also know that among many in the Autistic/Aspie community there seems to be a sort of hostility to religious beliefs or indeed spiritual beliefs of any kind among some of the members - not all of them of course. I often get the impression that public figured such as Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens are very popular among some segments of this community.

So I was wondering if there are other Aspies and Autistics here who are not anti theists like them and in addition have found that looking to spiritual, heaven based guidance as also assisted them in dealing with problems that they may have struggled with before. I would love to have outreach with those members here.


First, remember we have the option of being anonymous here. You need not be afraid of sharing personal information here unless you simply don't want to share. I am long past shame over being autistic. I'm also an atheist. That doesn't make me anti theist, whatever that actually means. It means I choose not to believe in magical thinking or supernatural explanations of things not yet fully understood by science. I don't care if you do. I care if you or others who hold religious beliefs try to make me live my life by their beliefs. That happens routinely here in the USA. As to criticism, I find far more criticism of being an atheist than of being religious, unless one happens to be Muslim these days...