Why I'm still not a Christian.

[KevinM1]

There are a bunch of reasons why I could never go back to being Catholic (thankfully, none of them involve a priest touching me), but I never fully bought into it to begin with. My parents were non-practicing. They believed, but I can count the number of times we actually went to church on one hand. I said this in my intro post, but when I was told I was baptized I cried. I was only 7 or 8 years old, but even then I felt like it was a violation of my right to choose, and I wasn't convinced that the Catholic god was the right one for me since I was aware of the existence of other religions in the world. My love of learning about ancient cultures in history class cemented those questions. "Why are their beliefs merely myths, but belief in Jesus considered truth? What about other religions like Islam?"

So, I went through a phase in high school and early college where I was essentially a deist. But even that wasn't satisfying. It was a belief that felt good, but wasn't supported by any evidence. I finally admitted to myself that I was an atheist shortly after 9-11 (no, it wasn't spurred by those events), and that I was always an atheist.

Unless there's legitimate, verifiable evidence of a god, I can never go back to believing in one. And I don't mean historical evidence that may or may not coincide with the stories. I need proof of the divine because the whole point of theism is believing in the miraculous. And I simply can't do that unless it meets very rigorous scrutiny.