Spirituality is just the space between our understanding and reality. While many, even in this thread, advocate for creating an idealistic fantasy in this gap for your own mental “health” or pleasure; personally, I don’t think it’s necessary to avoid hopelessness, and in fact is harmful when these fantasies act as blinders to reality in the one existence we get.

In a very real way, every cell that makes up the people we’ve lost recycles into the world around us. We are made of the universe before us, and will become the universe after us. So while our consciousness as we know it is temporary, our existence is not.

Same here. I was raised a Christian. Luckily the good types, love, community and peace. Then in my teenage years went atheist as I developed the classic Anti religion doctrine that it causes more harm than good. And now as young adult I have rekindled my spiritual side and take inspiration from Islam, Buddhism, Christianity and even Norse paganism and Greek patheon.

I still struggle to actually devote myself to one religion. On one side this keeps me floating and ungrounded. But to actually take the step to go to church etc also doesn’t feel necessary for me. On the other hand it allows me find my own way with God(s).

It depends on what you’re looking for. If you need something in life that really becomes your Red Line, that guides every action, then find a church/community and attend it. If you need a spiritual outlet then stay free forming it and take what works for you.

Nothing says you have to believe the same thing everyday, or even moment to moment. Think of your spirituality as kind of story, or a painting, or a song that you sing to yourself. Wouldn’t it be boring to sing the same song every day? There isn’t just one “greatest” song/poem/story/painting because you can’t fit all human experience or emotion into just one of them. I like to treat spirituality this way. Play with your relationship to life’s mysteries. Make an art of it to entertain and comfort yourself.

To be clear, I have some core values that I don’t change, and these inform my politics and how I interact with other people. When it comes to things like death, “the meaning of life”, the origins of the universe etc, I’m most comfortable with fluidity.

Death is a paradox. Whoever lives, can never see whats behind the door, and those who are dead, can never experience it, because to experience, you need to live.

You can paint the door colorful, create stories and paintings. But painting the door, will never describe or explain how it looks behind the door. Its just a painting of hopes. Hoping what it might be, but very likey isnt.

We can never shut off, we can never imagine the nonexistence. Its impossible for the consciouss mind to not experience anything. But we want to know. It makes us afraid to not know, which is the reason why we try to explain it and go on.

So, I would say. Find the picture that creates an inner peace within you. Or rather, create one, that fits with your viewings of the world and experience.

I reckon ‘wrestling’ is probably the wrong approach. I also reckon it’s pointless to worry about what happens to you after you die. The only thing you have knowledge of or control over are the the things that happen prior to that, so focus on that.

Not spiritual myself but you might want to look into Unitarian Universalism. It’s all about diversity, inclusivity, and spiritual exploration without a particular set of required beliefs or dogma. I believe it’s mostly concentrated in the US but you might find congregations elsewhere around the globe.

In my personal journey, I came to be permanently skeptical of all organized religions. None of them are infallible, all of them are a cult to a degree. Here are some other beliefs I hold today:

1 - There might be something real behind exorcisms and hauntings, regardless of the validity of the religions who treat them. I base this on conversations I’ve held with witnesses I trust.

2 - I don’t think there is only one higher power. Whether there are tiers, I cannot say.

3 - The evidence for reincarnation is fascinating. Check out the history of the university of Virginia and it’s department dedicated to the supernatural.

4 - Some people can see/commune with the dead. Whether any can do it at will is another story. Most of the people I believe are private about it, most of those who sell the service seem phony.

5 - Although I don’t believe in any religion, I was my best self when I did. Faith in a moral cause does wonders for the soul, regardless of factuality. Prayer, meditation, and ritual are good for the soul. Community is incredible.

as a Queer person

That alone will disqualify a lot of religions.

I’m uncertain If I believe in god

And that should take care of the rest. Are you sure it needs to be one of the organized religions?

I recommend you something like Buddhism or similar things. Its about finding your inner peace in stressful times, regardless of who you are. I feel like buddhism is the non-judging religion that has no god but still some good explanations about the world

Can you not get life guidance, community and inclusion without having to believe in the supernatural?

For me it isn’t really worth thinking about unfalsifiable things? If you’re looking for guidance, community, and inclusion, go join a socialist org or a queer community center?

I have this displaying as a bot account? 🤖

every religion and philosophical idea regarding spirituality is man made.

with that comes all mans motivations and ignorance.

personally, this puts both spirituality and religion on tenuous grounds if not outright fiction.

i feel we will experience the same thing after our death that we did before our birth; nothing.

I thought all bots blindly believed in silicon heaven. I mean where else would all of the calculators go?

Well, it’s my opinion that religion/spirituality is nice, but unnecessary. It’s a thing that can have benefits, sure. But it’s also something that’s got drawbacks. Since there can’t be proof that any given one is correct, nor that it isn’t tbh, it’s essentially a matter of deciding if you want to hang your hat on one at all.

I get that you’re seeking a sense of comfort, I didn’t miss that part. But it may end up where you don’t actually need it. See, you don’t need a system to have individual beliefs about the afterlife.

We can freely believe that there is something more to us than flesh and bone. Call it a soul if you want, or call it anything else at all. But if you believe it exists, then believing that the soul leaving the body is going to free it of the worries and woes of life is just the natural follow-up belief. You can even phrase it in pseudoscientific terminology if that works for you, and it actually does for some people.

But, if you need religion for your own sake, I would definitely go looking into things like universal unitarian churches. They stay as dogma neutral as it gets, are almost always queer friendly (and by the basis of the official organization are supposed to be because they reject nobody).

Buddhism can be a fairly nice choice, but you do run into the difficulties of which branch is actually in your area, and they aren’t all the same. Taoism can work because it’s pretty damn generalized to begin with; but there’s less “church” to it, where the community is a major part of things. Wicca and neopaganism are usually queer friendly, and a hell of a lot of fun,; though finding a group can be tricky since there’s a hundred flavors available and they aren’t all available everywhere since it’s a small genre of religion compared to anything else.

My take though? You’d be best served by connecting with your local LGBTQ+ community first, and then exploring any religious/spirituality options as you go. Having that kind of directly personal community to be part of is way more in an impact in quality of life than a generic one like a church. But it does take more effort because there’s no central “queer church” kind of thing where everyone is going to be there. It would be support groups, activist groups, queer specific hobby groups, and then you interact with that network to find queer friendly spaces in other areas of life if you don’t find fulfillment in the LGBTQ community itself.

I don’t think anyone out here can really know what you need. I sure can’t promise that my suggestion is going to be right for you. All I can say is that for the LGBTQ people in my life, they generally find more peace through community first, religion as a secondary or tertiary goal. And that’s usually most successful when they engage in queer spaces actively, being a part of supporting others.

But, shit, you ain’t gotta decide any time soon. Just on lemmy, there’s witchesvspatriarchy communities, Buddhism ones, and others. Run searches on whatever you want to look into, scroll through the communities that you find, see if the general vibe works for you and ask questions, engage with people. You get to “dabble” with low risk, and high rewards while you figure things out in meat space.

There’s multiple “ask” communities. This one, there’s [email protected], there’s a no stupid questions community ( though I can’t recall the instance offhand. It’s probably .world, what with it being big). Most of them are going to be fairly reliable for getting general questions like this one answered, and some of them do well with specific questions as well, when you run across concepts to explore. But just searching “ask” will pull up some.

I think the core point is that there’s a nigh infinite number of paths you can take to find what you need, you don’t have worry much about just finding one. You can always just hop to a different one