I'm not ready to let everyone know I'm an atheist yet until i have come out to my family personally. But I'm a 40ish year old white male that was raised in an extremely religious household. (my father was in seminary during my childhood, then on deputation to raise money for the mission field, then another year to learn the language in another country, then they(my parents) became missionary's in a south American country) I was old enough to not depart with them when they finally went to south America but otherwise i lived through the rest and everything that comes along with it. For example, we were home schooled for all of our elementary education, and of course we (my brothers and sisters and I) were force fed baptist beliefs (they were baptists). Theaters, rock and roll, dances, television, a host of other evil's were off limits growing up.

I considered myself a christian for the better part of my youth but I always had doubts and would "ask jesus into my heart" time and time again (just in case i didn't do it right the first time) because there was no way i was going to go to hell. I think this is because when i was about 6 or 7 years old, my parents took me & my younger brother to the billy graham tabernacle where the local christian college was putting on a performance depicting how horrible hell will be, it was probably about an hour or so long, but it was extremely vivid to me as a child and i believe that is what set the stage for the rest of my life in fear. I never had those feelings all my christian friends and family talked about having, the desire to "spread the good word" or even the desire to please him, it was only through fear that I obeyed the rules set before me. Eventually, I realized I wasn't getting the same thing out of it everyone else was and began to question what i had been taught, that was about 10 years ago. (slow learner huh?). I started to consider myself an "agnostic" because i didn't know if there was a god but i was afraid to admit there wasn't. (Hell would have been a horrible place).

A few years ago, my younger brother (2 years my younger & a devout christian) committed suicide, solid in his believe that when he pulled the trigger, he would be greeted on the other side by his lord. (this is especially depressing to me now that i realize that when that occurred, his lights went out, this is a really tough thing for me to think about.) I'm most afraid people will say i became an atheist because i was angry with god or something like that. Well, 1. I came to this conclusion on my own, outside my brothers circumstances, it made me think about it but it wasn't the cause of my disbelief. And 2. I can't be angry at something i don't believe in, I am, however, growing angrier at what caused him to believe that this life didn't matter because the one that matters is the one after this one, but i'm not angry at god because he doesn't exist.  But, since i had been putting off determining what exactly i do believe in, when he died i started to wonder what did happen after he pulled the trigger.

This is when i started to sit down and have discussions with my younger sister and her husband (I'm the eldest of a large family), thorough discussions about the bible and god and jesus and nature... He was especially "helpful" with an analytical mind, speaking enough science talk to make me feel comfortable, but eventually the discussion started to lead to things that didn't make sense or to the inevitable "you just gotta have faith". (I remember at one point when we were talking about stars, he said the scientists didn't really know anything about the stars or their composition because it was just "...lights in the sky and nothing more", this is when i started to realize the "scientific mind" i was looking for wasn't speaking the same language as I was). I read some books trying to validate the legitimacy of the bible, if i could verify that the bible was reliable, (especially the parts concerning the supernatural & most importantly his resurrection) then i could believe when jesus said everything regarding heaven/hell/god. These books at first helped to solidify my belief, but as i tried to follow them it didn't seem to hold water.

Eventually i decided that there was a god, but he wasn't going to accept me because i was a bad person. even though everything i was taught was to the contrary (IE: we all are sinners, no one is "good" enough in his eyes, we don't need to be, but i figured i was the exception), I didn't feel him as i reached out to him, he didn't "talk" to me. That "seek and ye shall find" didn't apply to me for some reason.

Now, one thing about me that might pertain at this point is, I've been diagnosed with bipolar disorder. I've attempted suicide myself a few times in the last 10 years. I was constantly berating myself in my head because i believed i was a no good evil person who didn't deserve to live and deserved to die and go to hell. This was reinforced after my brothers death and after i searched in earnest for him(god) and there was nothing, no response, zilch. If you had caught me at the right time 4 months ago, you would have found me crying into my desk at work, searching the internet for gun ranges that didn't have safety's in place that would let me rent a gun and end it there. I realized the bipolar medications were doing me no good, i never get manic anymore i'm just 100% of the time depressed, so i stopped taking them hoping maybe i'd go manic for some relief. I just wanted to end this life and either i would be in heaven because once saved always saved (from when i was young and did all those "backup" conversions), or i would be in hell because there was no way i was getting in heaven. Well, I lived like that for a few months, the main thing holding me back was what it would do to the rest of the family....

THEN MY WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN!!!!

I had been recently thinking a lot about North Korea and the "cult of personality" there. (and to a lesser extent other faiths throughout the world that most christians would consider "weird", out of this world, "how could they believe that?" kind of thing.) I began to realize if i had been born in one of those cultures I would be asked to believe these things "on faith" and how dangerous it is to just believe something "on faith". Then i started to see similarities between these religions and christianity, then i started to think about how christianity teachings BEGIN with teaching a fear of hell. If i wanted to create a cult and get people to do something i wanted them to do, and created a doctrine, the FIRST thing you have to do is create a reason for people to believe you. BOOM??? This was a LONG thought process for me months and months, but one day driving home from work, there was like a snap in the back of my head, and i had a moment similar to the moment you realized Bruce Willis was dead the whole time in the end of sixth sense....HOLY FUCK THERE IS NO GOD?????

This was about a month ago,

I'm 41

It feels  like my life is beginning anew, i have to rethink every thought I've ever had in my life, but now, understanding that this is our only life, it's precious, I need to start living!!! (I'm having a little trouble thinking through all the implications of this however. My mind feels flooded) And to top it all off, i have realized in the last few days that i believe i may be manic, I've realized this, and i don't believe I've done anything irrational recently, I have purchased a new computer, but i needed one, after that I had a large AC repair bill and a large car repair bill the next day (god punishing me? lol) but otherwise I don't believe i'm acting irrationally, but I've learned to second guess myself. I can definitely tell though the last couple days that I am manic, and tomorrow i plan to make a doctors appointment and get back on my meds. I'm a little concerned he'll see my newfound atheism as a symptom of my mania and something to be cured & hospitalize me. It's a VA psych, so I'd hope the government wouldn't employ someone that might do that. I'm also really hoping this isn't a "moment of clarity" that will go away when i get back on my medication, but i don't believe i was manic when i came to the realization, i believe the realization was a trigger for me that caused me to go into mania, even though i did stop the meds a few weeks before the realization.

ANYWAYS, medical history aside, this is a glorious time for me, and i FINALLY feel what everyone my whole life was talking about, this "religious experience" or whatever, wanting to tell the world, i want to free the minds of everyone i care about. I want to find other atheists and start to contemplate my new godless world (it's soooo weird, 2 months ago that would have sounded like such a negative sentence).

Thank you for reading this, I needed to share.

It's very nice to meet you CBENA. Make yourself at home you are very welcome here

Hello there, nice to meet you

Thank you so much for sharing your story. I'm really sorry to hear about your brother, that is just awful

You've been through a real rollercoaster of a journey, and you've done an amazing job of being able to wake up from the programming. You are spot on, teaching hell to children is a dead giveaway that things are not on the level, as well as being absolutely vile. How dare they mess with your childhood like that and give you haunting images just to get you to conform?

I'm really glad you joined us, and I hope you stick around You're reasoning is sound, religion is mostly down to indoctrination (uncritically teaching dogma). Where you grow up has a very strong correlation with what you end up "believing".

Now you've seen through all the bullshit, it's unlikely they'll trap you again with it. You can always talk to us about your future experiences, and we can help you through any doubts

Enjoy the forum!

Awesome, withy, good to have you here! I think you'll fit right in here

Welcome.

You've had a long and very difficult journey.

Glad you made it. We're a very supportive communuty. I hope you'll like it here

I'm hoping that once you start to feel homey you'll make good use of that name change option. You sure picked a tongue twister

(October 5, 2015 at 3:40 am)Losty Wrote: I'm hoping that once you start to feel homey you'll make good use of that name change option. You sure picked a tongue twister

probably after i come out to my family. i intend to do it before having to "give thanks to him" at our typical family gathering this november.

Welcome Mr.long-name, Please make yourself right at home. If you are still worried about your soul, feel free to send it to me, and I'll wash it clean for you.

Welcome matey...
It's wrong what you they've done to you...
You and everyone else should have been brought up thinking clearly and logically and then as adults if you have a kink towards the supernatural, go for it.
Undoing decades of indoctrination will take time. Let me stress, it should never have occurred.
Many here feel and compare it to child abuse...
You've done well finding your way out on your own... Yes, your suspicions are correct, the vast majority of us here feel it's all a nice load of BS.
As are all other religions.

Wow... what a story!
Welcome aboard, dude.
If your meds make you believe again, then so be it.... somehow, I doubt they'll do that.


It's when I read this kind of story that I think someone should package all these "conversion" stories into a neat little volume.
It may become a rather repetitive book, but it just comes to show the standard path.
As the potential first, can I have your permission to perform such a collection?