About religious addiction

There is not much practical advice on how to escape from the clutches of religion. Religion is a source of peace and life, but at the same time it can also be a curse, a prison that destroys a person as a creation of God, created for the joy of life, spiritual growth and love in the broadest sense.

How to free the mind and soul from the hell established by priests?

The goal of churchmen is not to open eyes, but to impose guilt, to cause internal confusion and to take over.

This is not about when a person feels guilty that he has wronged, taken advantage of, wrongly accused, slandered or otherwise harmed someone. When he maliciously interfered with the life, development, joy and happiness of another.

Are you benefiting from the self-loathing and the sense of alleged guilt provoked by priests?

There is a real gulf between what churchmen say and do. Priests like to say: don't look at what I do, listen to what I say. And they call for help with interpretations of the Bible. Holy Scripture, which in its essence provides the fullness of life, the opportunity to marvel at God's creations, faith in goodness and his love, which is also transmitted among people. This is a formula for hypocrisy. Hypocrisy is not holy, the holiness of hypocrisy is a deception.

Priests, who are supposed to stand as spiritual people, knowing all the theology, the depth of Christ's teaching, themselves behave in ways that ordinary people would not be able to do because of their intuitive or learned moral compass: wealth, money, fornication with young people, etc. This means spitting in God's face.

The illusion of holiness is the greatest achievement of the church, its entire foundation. The illusion was not formed in one day. It has been ingrained in my mind since childhood, very cleverly linked to all sorts of pictures, ambiguous symbols, and the fear of eternal death.

In this case, it is worth remembering that the Bible forbids the worship of carvings, moldings, paintings and other idols and fetishes. All those magical things were not put on your head by the God you are so afraid of, but by his alleged representatives. The church is actually doing what the God it is beckoning prohibits.

It is not paintings and images that enslave, but very cunning, insidious professionals, the so-called "mediators", who sow guilt without guilt and fear in people's hearts.

Is an intermediary between man and God needed? God is everywhere, everywhere hears you and will respond when the time comes for you - will give you a sign, a person or an event. And sometimes he will pull you out of total muck by the ears. He will heal a wounded heart, soothe pain and light a smile on your face. A smile not with guilt and restrictions, but with inner spiritual freedom, the joy of being on Earth, not with pushing through the days here and hoping for some paradise after wasting the life allotted to the soul. Then there is true worship and admiration of the Creator, but as a friend who leads through the pits, who loves and does not judge. Maybe this is the feeling of paradise.

But we can go further - to make God our greatest ally. After all, we are guided by religion, and faith is not religion. Religion is a form of internal control of people, a very complex system that has its own rituals, structure, doctrine and manipulates people's feelings in pursuit of benefit and power.

The church must reform, turn to the fundamental words of Christ. Accept everyone, with different orientations, views, everyone who seeks to grow in spirit, to be better for each other. He said: come to me all, all who suffer and are happy, I will revive you. Christ came not as a judge, but as a teacher, which is why his teaching has remained alive for 2000 years. The church must become a home where harmony, peace, hope and comfort are found. And not just a mass, after which only the performance of the ritual is felt. As one priest said: the mass begins when you leave the church.

Psychologists have discovered an interesting thing: the image of God in everyone's mind is different. It depends a lot on the personality of the believer. The God of a child raised by strict and abusive parents is just as strict and abusive, counting every minor offense, the God of cruel parents is even cruel, while a child raised by gentle, cheerful parents can perceive his God as a good, friendly and even cheerful being. The current study has shown that in our psyche the image of him with gentle, even feminine features prevails, unlike the cruel, old uncle with a gray beard. Who, instead of warmth and love for his creatures, only aims to release lightning from the sky.

If your God is friendly, you can boldly call on him for help. After all, you are free from the hypocrisy of the church and its servants.

Try to change the image of an evil, cruel monster represented by priests into the image of a good, loving, forgiving Father or Friend. By the way, you will find both the previous and such images in the Bible. In the Old Testament, God is more cruel, difficult to predict, while in the Gospels, the religious rebel Jesus talks about God as a loving, very good father waiting for his children, to whom you can return at any time, and you will be very kindly welcomed.

If the believers, who are possessed by the church, would once overcome the fear instilled by the priests and dare to study all four gospels on their own, they would see that what is happening in the churches is not at all what the great religious rebel taught. In fact, Jesus did not create any religion and did not teach obedience to the priests, but on the contrary - he tried to free people from the power of "intermediaries" and directed all his criticism not at ordinary people, such as us, but at the priests, the scribes (theologians) and the Pharisees (tax collectors). He criticized the elite for hypocrisy and emphasis on the letter of the law.

Formally, Christianity began with the works and teachings of Jesus, described in the four gospels, but throughout its history, all two thousand years, the church did the opposite of what Jesus taught. Let us remember the Inquisition, the persecution of scientists, the burning of alleged "witches" (where there is leniency, only cruelty and a demonstration of power). There is nothing to talk about the Crusades at all. Justification of robberies. Imagine Jesus with the sign of the Crusaders, or burning "witches". Absurd. Isn't that why the church forbade ordinary people to read the Holy Scriptures on their own? After all, in the Middle Ages it even punished with death for this! For this reason alone, you need to read it yourself and draw your own conclusions.

I assure you: after reading all four Gospels, you will not find anywhere a command to go to church, to go to confession, to say long prayers, to call priests pastors or even “holy” fathers. Jesus forbade all this! Don’t you believe it?

In Matthew 23:9 Jesus says: “And call no one on earth your father, for you have one Father, who is in heaven.” He also criticized those who loved positions of power and exclusive titles.

Jesus certainly warned against acting like hypocrites who thought they would be heard because of their “multiplicity of words” (Matthew 6:7). Instead, he left a short “Our Father” prayer.

Regarding confession and church attendance: You will not find in the Gospels an instruction to go to a brick building every Sunday. Jesus emphasized the inner attitude and “spirit and truth” more often. However, the Catholic tradition bases confession on John 20:23 (“Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven them”), although this is more of an interpretation than a direct command to “go to the hearing room.”

Where in Matthew 23 does Jesus directly criticize religious formalism?

“Loading burdens” (verses 1–4): When standards are set for others that teachers themselves do not lift a finger.

“Outward splendor” (verses 5–12): Focus on clothes, first places, and titles.

“Whited tombs” (verses 27–28): Perhaps the strongest metaphor for external cleanliness and internal rot.

About marriage, which Jesus did not consider a prison, because God certainly does not seek to torture or stifle a person. Marriage is intended to unite people to help them overcome difficulties. To raise children. Help each other grow, develop, which is close to the divine plan.

Jesus taught that marriage is a divine union that God unites into “one flesh,” and therefore

man should not separate it. Although he emphasized the indissolubility of marriage until death, his teaching and subsequent apostolic interpretations provide for certain exceptions and possibilities for “liberation”:

Jesus argued that from the beginning God created man and woman to be together for life. He explained that Moses’ permission to divorce was given only because of the “hardness of people’s hearts,” and not as part of God’s original plan.

The “fornication” exception: In the Gospel of Matthew, Jesus gives the only direct exception – divorce is possible in the case of fornication (Greek porneia). If one party breaks fidelity, the injured party is allowed to separate.

“Letting Go” and Abandonment (Pauline Privilege): If this is the case where a partner “lets go” (leaves) you, Christian theology draws on the teachings of the apostle Paul. He stated: “If the unbelieving partner wishes to depart, let him depart; a brother or a sister is not bound in such cases” (1 Cor. 7:15). This means that if a partner voluntarily leaves and leaves, the abandoned person becomes free.

End of Marriage After Death: Jesus made it clear that after death (in the resurrection), people neither marry nor are given in marriage, and the marriage vow is only valid as long as both partners are alive.

Modern interpretations also emphasize that “hardness of heart” can manifest itself through violence or abuse, which is sometimes seen as a spiritual breach of the marriage bond, providing a basis for self-protection.

Freedom from “bonds”: Paul uses the word ou dedoulōtai (not enslaved/bound). This is understood as moral and spiritual freedom, when the person left is no longer obliged to continue a life together, which has become impossible due to the departure of the other party.

A Christian is called upon to do everything possible to preserve the marriage (1 Cor. 7:12-14), but is not responsible for the other person's free decision to leave.

You must see that the Jesus who frightens people in churches is not at all the same Jesus who walked among the common people and tried to free them from the slavery of priests and scribes (theologians). He denied revenge (an eye for an eye, etc.) and brought light (the new and everlasting covenant).

Here it is as in the case of alcoholism: you stop drinking, and the pain of a hangover never goes away. Similarly - with religion. The church does not bring peace, but causes fear and anxiety, provokes self-loathing, a sense of alleged guilt, and only then gives "bliss" - a very short respite. But if you are not tormented by self-loathing, what do you need from the so-called forgiveness of your alleged sins? (And it is not the priest who forgives sins, but God, so to speak.) To reconcile with God, to trust in him, and to be guided by his ten commandments (as much as possible in their original version) is the path to life. Otherwise, one slides into fanaticism, mutilation of soul and body, and spiritual death.

Vigmantas Balevičius, Lithuania