Hail Mary/ Hell? No! Part One of How I See It

Although the title of this post may look confusing, It makes a lot of sense to me. Hopefully I will be able to explain it as I go along. It has alot to do with my beliefs over this lifetime.

As a young child growing up in mid america I would have these strange dreams. At the time I excused them as bad dreams. I dreamed about being in a different time and place. They were usually dreams about battle and being killed. Some were about being a slave in ancient europe. When I was about 11 or so the dreams stopped. Today I tend to believe they were dreams of former lives that I have lived. No way to prove it, just a conclusion of mine. Part of the reason I have come to believe in reincarnation.

I was raised a catholic as a young man. Went to cathechism every saturday and became indoctrinated into the catholic beliefs. In my mind I rebelled against a lot of thier teachings. The parts about going to hell if you didn't follow the catholic way. And the guilt they tried to put on you for even having certain thoughts.

The prayer "Hail Mary" was one you usually had to repeat a certain number of times depending on how grevious your sin, after going to confession. Sort of a mantra.
I can see how the catholic church used Mary as a Goddess substitute when they tried converting the pagan peoples of europe and the british isles. It helped making the transition in beliefs.

I never did buy into the catholic teachings of hell and the devil. Just felt it was another one of thier ways of using fear to motivate. However, today I can see where there might be negative forces at work in the natural world just as there are positive forces.

Today I can accept all beliefs that have a positive effect on the one who believes it as long as it has no negative effect on others. All religions and beliefs have faults, after all they were created by humans,not Gods as some profess.