[...] That nobody, no matter how rational, is immune to being indoctrinated. Just look at how many brilliant people embrace religions. It's hardcoded in the human mind. It's necessary to either avoid it, or to face it head on. To look at the apologetic arguments, and the rebuttals, and decide for yourself. To stay rational.
If you just sit there in church with nothing else to pay attention to, you will eventually believe. That's what hymns do, and fellowship, and sheer boredom. Lack of external stimuli is the core of brainwashing. That's WHY THEY DO IT.
Err, this bit is very misleading.
It's lacking the criticality of noting the subjects it mentions (and lacking specificity to the
attitude it claims to be hardcoded. When you're working with concepts and how concepts are being accepted into the field of logic...please don't mix up how the process works. >_<
...nobody, no matter how rational, is immune to being indoctrinated. Just look at how many brilliant people embrace religions. It's hardcoded in the human mind. It's necessary to either avoid it, or to face it head on. To look at the apologetic arguments, and the rebuttals, and decide for yourself. To stay rational.
But that's the rub. I feel that once I commit to either Atheism or Christianity, that room for being rational will disappear. Committing to one side pushes out the other so I've never wanted to face that kind of commitment. But then again, I've got a lot of my life ahead of me so we'll see...
That's where fear comes in--when you're uncertain of the specifics you're facing. Commitment does not mean the lack of rationality (nor do those who follow a religion mean they are any where less rational than those who don't, atheistic or anti-theistic); the core point lies in how interpretations go and what they mean as a lifestyle habit (which in regards to you and your mother, talk it over with the pastors there).
Religion and children both tend to be high-concern, low-thought topics, which breeds a lot of needless bullshit in regards to them. Placing the two together is a recipe for bad things for no reason, so at some point you might just have to accept that she's mentally ill and will remain unhappy because of that.
I know, right? Me and her are on good terms in literally everything else but every time she brings this up it creates nothing but strife. You weren't far off on your mentally ill guess, either. She suffers from chronic anxiety so avoiding this subject might be the best approach...
Um ._. IO, and DDP...I'd like y'all to beware using the idea of mentally ill (when you're pertaining to 'something this person does repeatedly and attached-ly'). It's...misleading (and pathologizing x_x) because it's not covering 'why' she does that, the many possibilities that can be done to work with it, and the context which makes this happen (and many other factors that lead me to nudge the use of those terms).
The anxiety, though, can be really worked on [See note above on Talking this over with your pastors.] since it is bound to concepts and interactions/interpretations. [If she is concerned about your soul being damned forever because you do not attend church, totally bring this up with your Pastors since you may need a trustworthy third-party to help you there. And this thread really won't help you solve the problem since we can't fully see what's going on there.]
I pride myself on being a very rational Christian, unfortunately that mostly results in admitting that my faith is irrational.
High-five much?
I disagree on the latter part, and agree more on 'people's interpretations may lead to irrationality'. A lack of rationality can only be said when the only one method being used, is the only one method being described.