There is a BIG difference between being religious and being spiritual.  Not all who are religious are spiratual, and not all who are spiratual are religious.  I think spiritual can be defined differently by each person you may ask, I view religious as those living, practicing their faith to include the organized religion of a church or some other group.  I am spiritual, but I am definitely NOT religious.  I do not believe in nor do I buy into organized religion.  I don't need a group of people who talk the talk but won't walk the walk, and a pastor to symbolize God or to make me feel any closer to God.

I was raised a Baptist.  Strictkly.  So by the terms I was taught as a child and the lessons I learned from the church, I'll burn in hell no matter what I believe!! hah

No church would support my beliefs, and that really doesn't phase me.  I believe that the Bible is THE Word of God, so according to the Bible, I have accepted Christ, and I believe in that, I have faith in that, and I turn to Him for guidence, comfort, strength, support, advise, and all that i need HE is the first informed and consulted.  So I don't need to buy into the churches conventional rules.

I am forever grateful to God........ For carrying me through all the times I fell, and for knowing He will carry me through all the times I will fall.  I am grateful  and thankful that He has opened my eyes and that He does make his presence known in my life every single day. 

I know I will live an eternal life without pain or sorrow.  I know I will see my little girl again.  I know I will someday learn the reason why God took her away so early.  I will someday know weather or not I am following the path I believe he has chosen for me. 

I hurt inside for those friends of mine that I have here in my life that I will not see in heaven.  I sometimes shed tears when I think of what their future holds for them.  I pray that I can lead them to Christ by being a good example.  I pray that the Lord will keep them safe and open their eyes to the truth, and that he will show me those oppertunities to wittness to them in a manner that they will listen and that they might hear.

My brother, Mark Rosenberger, is a bible thumpin, pulpit pumpin Christian.  The same guy who treats his parents like shit and turns his back on family for their inconvenience.  Take that one step further I have reason to believe he's a wife beater and probably knocked his kids around too.  Yeah, that is a great example of a Chriastian.  Hasn't spoken to his own mother since he was a young adult.  Won't lift a finger or put forth an ounce of effort to be of any use, benefit, or company even to anyone in his family outside his immediate family.  Has to drive right past our Dad's road on his way to work every day, but wouldn't think to stop and see him once in a while, unless he wanted something.  He is JUST LIKE HIS MOTHER, right down to the very fact that he will never admit it!  Yet he has the balls to get up and preach "honor thy father and mother"!  Ha ha ha ha ha kiss my christian butt brother!  God doesn't say you have to like your parents, or even love them, he says to honor them. I've watched his thumb his nose at his own flesh and blood, I've watched his literally BEAT HIS FATHER over a lump of property.  He literally threw me out of his house once because I took his three boys 6 trailers down the street to see their Grandma (I was 10 years old).  And I know for a fact he censored his wife and kids, not only what they could hear, see, who could talk to them, but what they could say, do, where they could go, and who they could talk to - including their own families. The last time I called him i spoke to my nephwe, God forbid, and he wasn't able to censor the conversation and blew a cork over it.  I was banned from speaking to my nephew again.  One of three whom i haven't seen in YEARS.  That is control and manipulation.  This is NOT the way of a christian or a Christian family. 
-- Whatever --

A while back when I was at the bottom of the bottom of my pit of depression (1997-8), I emailed Mark and asked him if he would please be my big brother.  No preaching, no lectures, just BE my big BROTHER, because family is what I needed.  Not only did he NOT answer me, but he dropped of the face of the cyber globe.  I haven't heard from him since.  Yeah, that's the "Christian way".  How dare I ask such an impossible task of him.

It's not Mark that drove me away from the church, it is the endles examples of hypocrisy, the pots calling the kettles black, the jugmentalists, the holier-than-thous in general that drove me away from the church!