I think I always "knew" I was an atheist. As for what triggered me to start calling myself one... it was probably when I began relying on logic to figure things out in my life, and since I failed to see any logic behind religious beliefs, I had to accept atheism as the right view.

Religion never really had an influence on me. My family wasn't religious, it was rarely talked about, so I was able to come to the conclusion myself.

There were two huge problems I had with my faith.

I was a born again Christian but one of the problems I had was knowing that evolution was true and trying to make sense of the Bible at the same time. Where does one draw the line between poetic descriptions of the world and events that supposedly happened like the content of the NT? There seems to be a continuity from cover to cover in the Bible that made me doubt if one could even draw that sort of line, between symbolic theological verses and real life events.

The second thing is based on the fact that no matter how strong my faith was, I never had anything happen to me that I could remotely call an encounter with God. Even the seperate parts of the trinity I never tangibly felt. So I just found it odd that the Creator was incredibly shy with me...

So over the past few years I've had my ups and downs with my faith but the thing that made me snap out of it beyond any point of return is a missing messiah that I can't find historically. Also, considering the vagueness of who wrote what in the Gospels and even some of Paul's letters, I think the probability that the sources are true witnesses is close to zero.

Learning enough history to see that the church version made no fucking sense at all.

I questioned things from an early age, but it was actually when I sat down to read the bible from cover to cover. I wanted to read it, hoping it would help me regain my childhood faith, which had waned to a more apathetic outlook on religions. I was an atheist by exodus.

Asking "What planted the seed?" is assuming that there was a theism into which it can be planted. Like Mediamogul I have never been a godbotherer because it was never indocrinated into me as a child. I did however have an experience that changed my atheism from something that was in the background and not a major part of my thinking, into something that assumed more importance in my life. When I moved town a few years ago, my children were at junior school (ages 6 and 8). The nearest school to my new house was a Catholic primary school. Upon inquiry I was told in no uncertain terms that the school governors would not consider my children because they had not been christened. The knowledge that my local and national tax paid to build and run this school but my children were denied access because they hadn't had the beads rattled over them made my blood boil. From that moment on I became much more active about secularism. Incidently, my children went to a very good school a little further away.

(Just for info, in the UK, religious groups are allowed to run state schools. The state pays for the construction and running of it i.e. teachers salaries, building maintenance etc. but the board of governors, comprising the vicar/priest, church elders etc. retain the power to choose which children are accepted. Naturally they mostly select those from their own church or, if there are suffficient places, perhaps children of members of another denomination - but no children of atheists unless they are desperate to fill the rolls. A common practice in the UK is for "pretend Christians" to attend their local church for the purpose of getting in with the vicar and their children into the local church school. These state financed religious schools are mostly either Church of England Anglican or Roman Catholic, but there are a handful of Muslim/Hindu ones.)

Regards

Grimesy

Arguing with my grandmother about abortion. I was a hard-core 'pro-lifer' and she was quite a bit more liberal. One day I realized that I was getting two completely different 'stories' and someone was wrong. After doing a bit of research on that, I found myself changing my mind on the subject - and realizing that if all those preachers, teachers, and such were wrong about that (or outright lying), they might just be wrong about a lot of other things. It took nearly five years, but there came a day when I realized I was an atheist.

Nobody saw fit to plant the seed of religion in the first place.

By the time I went to a Church of England school, I'd already dismissed it.

More recently I've reexamined my philosophical position, because I was atheist by default. I read more philosophy and science, and stayed atheist.

I have a mostly uninteresting conversion story.

(April 3, 2012 at 4:20 am)pgrimes15 Wrote: Asking "What planted the seed?" is assuming that there was a theism into which it can be planted. Like Mediamogul I have never been a godbotherer because it was never indocrinated into me as a child. I did however have an experience that changed my atheism from something that was in the background and not a major part of my thinking, into something that assumed more importance in my life. When I moved town a few years ago, my children were at junior school (ages 6 and 8). The nearest school to my new house was a Catholic primary school. Upon inquiry I was told in no uncertain terms that the school governors would not consider my children because they had not been christened. The knowledge that my local and national tax paid to build and run this school but my children were denied access because they hadn't had the beads rattled over them made my blood boil. From that moment on I became much more active about secularism. Incidently, my children went to a very good school a little further away.

(Just for info, in the UK, religious groups are allowed to run state schools. The state pays for the construction and running of it i.e. teachers salaries, building maintenance etc. but the board of governors, comprising the vicar/priest, church elders etc. retain the power to choose which children are accepted. Naturally they mostly select those from their own church or, if there are suffficient places, perhaps children of members of another denomination - but no children of atheists unless they are desperate to fill the rolls. A common practice in the UK is for "pretend Christians" to attend their local church for the purpose of getting in with the vicar and their children into the local church school. These state financed religious schools are mostly either Church of England Anglican or Roman Catholic, but there are a handful of Muslim/Hindu ones.)

Regards

Grimesy

I actually thought that catholic schools were church funded. It's pretty outrageous that the government is funding religious schools.

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(April 2, 2012 at 7:43 pm)Phil Wrote: But we are all born atheists until we are taught religion. So wouldn't the answer be birth?

No because you are not born an atheist OR theist. You aren't anything.

To be an atheist, there needs to be theism for you to not believe in. But you need to know of theism and the god concept to be able to not accept it. This is not possible at birth.

Atheism begins at the point you are aware that people believe in god, and that you yourself disbelieve it.

(April 2, 2012 at 7:31 pm)Aegrus Wrote: What planted the seed of atheism in your mind, so to speak? Do you remember what started you down this path?

Nothing. I was an atheist before I even knew what an atheist was. Lack of belief is the default position and the fact that I have never been part of any religion means there was no seed.

I disagree that lack of belief is the default position, and would say the same about belief. Lack of belief denotes that you are aware of a belief and do not accept it. Another subject you might believe based on evidence so there can't really be a default position.