Hello, recovering Catholic here

[abaris]

Hi!

I'm an atheist agnostic for a long time. I'm born and raised in Austria in a Catholic family, as is usual in my country. Funny thing, both of my grandfathers were jewish. I only got to know one, since the other one died way back in 1936. And I never knew what it meant to be jewish whilst my grandfather was still alive. He was the most secular guy you could imagine and the only things reflecting to his original believes was the occasional jiddish word and the mandatory mazze at easter. Not because of religion, but because of tradition. Otherwise he had a passion for fried pork.

Anyway, my family wasn't fundamentalist or anything. They were Easter and Christmas Catholics. I learnerd a bit about Jesus, but it mostly stayed in the usual childish magical realm. We have this thing in Austria, quite similar to Santa in the Anglo Saxon countries. It's called "Christkind". It's usually depicted as a winged child and brings the presents at christmas. Being small, I came to trust in that image rather than the religious Jesus.

But then school hit. In the late 60ies, there was still mandatory religious education. And it was as bad as the worst nightmares. A culture of fear of hell was implanted into the children. And that's why I'm still recovering. I never bothered reading the bible, I never reflected on the trinity nonsense or anything remotely religious, but it took a very long time to get rid of the childish fears being implanted in my brain as a small child.

When I was 16, it was the first time I came to actively question the believe system. For some reason I was going to confession, but on my way there, I came to realize, that the priest had absolutely no business knowing what my "sins" were. I turned around and walked away. I didn't give it much thought at the time and didn't give it much thought in years to come. But later, taking a walk in the woods, I suddenly had the thought of it all being too simple. This whole believe system crushed and I call myself an agnostic since then.

Now, I don't believe in any god. I certainly don't believe in the biblical god, contradicting himself, being hateful and bigotted at every given occasion and punishing you for the smallest sin in your lifetime with eternal torment in hell. I put my whole trust in science.

In my country it's easier to be out as an atheist as - say - in the US. Nobody gives a damn about your religion or lack thereoff. It's not a question to be asked.