Religion vs. Power of the mind?

[Leafed]

I am a 17 year old that grew up in a Catholic household and raised catholic, trained catholic, catholic, catholic, catholic, catholic, catholic, catholic, catholic, catholic, ....

And this is not an argument of which is in a sense... correct, but just a thought and could be debated.

Is religion more something that manifests in the mind of people that are led at an earlier time from something unexplainable and followed someone who had the sense to jump on it, therefore the miracles that they experience in their lifetimes are used to back their theory of their religion. The mind is a very powerful thing and can help humans do extraordinary things.

[Award Winning Boss]

The mind does many things to help it cope with reality .... even if it involves helping them escape it. Then over many many years, societies put the dots together to form religion.

So yes, the mind is extraordinary

[Leafed]

Haha well I guess it isn't really a debate is it. Though it could spark a sort of argument.... I only noticed this since I look at things that happen now a days and how people are thinking (Excited to study TOK more in depth) and that people can force themselves to believe things, and believe other people to believe things with them. I think that maybe thousands of years ago someone noticed this with people and formed a religion about it...whatever gets you through the day~

[URA BOAT]

you can do many things with your mind but it all starts with a thought

[Gee :)]

I find this topic quite interesting because I recently had an experience that caused me to question things.

I have had a few religious beliefs in my life.As a child,I was a Christian.When I reached my early teens I became athiest for a short while and then I settled on being agnostic.

In my life,I have had a lot of self doubt and have been afraid to shine.One of my friends whom I met through IB is a Christian - at first i was very cynical about her religious beliefs but over time I became more tolerant of them.Eventually,she shared with me a youtube video of a famous pastor.Around this time,there were nominations for the class valedictorian.Despite previous failures,I wanted to be valeditorian because it was outside my comfort zone but I did not believe that it could actually happen because I had stiff competition and did not ,at the time,feel I deserved it as much as one of my other friends.Anyway,the weekend before the nominations,I openmindedly watched the video of the pastors sermon and it moved me.I didn't believe in Christianity anymore than I did previously but I believed the message.I started internally justifying why I should be valedictorian and I believed it.When the time came to make nominations, I made a speech which convinced my classmates to elect me as the valedictorian.

What puzzles me is what exactly was behind such a powerful occurence.Religion or power of the mind ?

The religious video changed my mindset.My optimisim led to a change in my behaviour.

So would I credit this event as something powered by a high power

or the result of a change in my mindset??It could easily be either.

My current conclusion is that whichever way I look at it ,it was optimism.

In this case, religion and mind power are really the same thing in different costumes.Optimism

As I understand it,Chrisianity and other religions encourage people to have a positive attitude and be the best that they can be.

thats optimism.THey may believe that a higher power is rewarding them and protecting them.

Alternatively,being optimistic can have exactly the same results,without the belief in a God.However,i have found

d that it is rather difficult to be optimistic without a God (personal opinion) and perhaps people subscribe to religion because it gives them a "concrete" thing to help them maintain positivity.

I hope this somewhat addresses the point you were trying to raise.