Actor, comedian Katt Williams says he isn't religious but roots his self-worth in God

For celebrated actor and comedian Katt Williams, God is real because he talks to Him and He keeps answering back.

And despite growing up in a household where he was physically abused as a child by his parents, who were practicing Jehovah's Witnesses, Williams, 55, says his personal relationship with God has evolved into an independent nondenominational practice without affiliation with any particular religion. 

In a recent interview with “The Diary of a CEO” host Steven Bartlett, Williams said that despite the difficult childhood that forced him to run away from home at 13, he never thinks less of himself because his self-worth is rooted in God.

"I was in a better position than most [people] because I wasn't basing my self-worth on myself. I was putting all of that on the God that I serve and putting Him in a position to where it was, yeah, 'If you're real and you love me and you know I love you too, then I don't think you're going to let me just get tossed about on the waves out here,'" Williams said.

"I think that if I do my best to become a better person and to make better decisions, I think that that's going to be reciprocated."

Williams, who rejected his parents’ religion because he didn’t want to be a hypocritical follower, says he doesn’t think he could have accepted God’s existence if his prayers had gone unanswered.

“I personally wouldn't feel like God was real if it wasn't for the fact that I'm having these conversations. I'm asking for the things that I need, and I'm getting answers to them, and I'm following what I think the answer is saying,” he told Bartlett.

“So you're able to see that all the mistakes were me. Like I thought the wrong thing. I was thinking the wrong thing. I wasn't aware of, and I would just make the decisions. But you're not out here alone, and you shouldn't feel that,” he argued.

Williams said he has not joined a religious group because he doesn’t completely agree with any denomination. He accepts, however, that the world is better off with religious practice.

“After studying the religions, there are parts I agree with [in] all of them. At the end of the day, these are people and most of these people are just trying to be better people. And religion is what they're using to do that,” he said. “But I couldn’t imagine where the world would be if we didn’t have that, if there weren’t people actively trying to be better.”

Williams, who recently released a memoir titled Nine Lives, No Wives, and 69 Concubines, says that while he believes his skills as a comedian are a gift from God, he learned early in life to separate religion from having a personal relationship with God.

“I made a separation between religion and a relationship with God, and I assumed that for whatever nationality or creed or race that the person was, their personal religion was their way of explaining and handling and dealing with a relationship with God,” he explained.

“Even as an adult, I found for the most part that regardless of what someone's religion is, the key thing is that in their religion, they are attempting to get the people that follow them to be better people. And I learned from studying other religions … how much different religions are really agreeing with one another. There's not all of that much disagreement as far as what the goal is in religion,” he argued.

“It’s really just acknowledging the fact that you have free will to make terrible decisions and to be an awful person and to do awful things to other people. But you would live a much better life if you had a list of things that you don't do … that you won't cross,” he said.

“And if you feel an obligation to your Creator, then there are ways that you show that giving back to others and a heightened level of humanity is what all religious people are after. So I respect that even though I don't join the religion.”