Atheists that camed out of the closed

[Der/die AtheistIn]

These questions are addressed to atheists who used to be religious, deconverted and later told their families and friends. How did they react? Do you regret telling them?

[Succubus]

I'm pretty sure these questions were answered in your other almost identical threads.

[Der/die AtheistIn]

I'm pretty sure these questions were answered in your other almost identical threads.

Maybe, but I don't know if I should ever tell my parents or how should I tell them about my atheism. That's why I want to hear more from other experiences.

[SteelCurtain]

My parents were shocked and upset.

But they got over it and we don't talk about it specifically even though I'm pretty close with them.

[vorlon13]

My parents were shocked and upset.

But they got over it and we don't talk about it specifically even though I'm pretty close with them.

Do they still hope against hope that you will regain your senses and become a priest ???

[Inkfeather132]

My parents didn't really care. They still think god will get through to me one day, but they don't believe in Hell so they see no real reason why anyone has to believe if it doesn't make your life any better.

[Chad32]

I don't regret telling them. They don't like it, but they didn't take it as bad as some people in stories I've read or heard about. I wasn't disowned, and no one got violent. My sister seems to want me to keep my religious views away from her children, as she sends them to a christian school and works to indoctrinate them.

[Astonished]

I'm pretty sure these questions were answered in your other almost identical threads.

Maybe, but I don't know if I should ever tell my parents or how should I tell them about my atheism. That's why I want to hear more from other experiences.

Not until you're completely financially independent from them, and you are able to own a firearm. Just making sure you'll have all your bases covered.

I don't really have anyone close enough to me that it matters to them if I'm religious or not, but anyone I do routinely hang out with knows I'm an anti-theist and either is too, or is so fairweather about their belief (freely admitting that they're not even sure whether they believe or which parts, since they don't really think about it) they basically might as well be atheists. It literally never comes up in conversation with them so if I didn't ask, I'd have been pretty safe to assume they were atheists anyway. My foster parents were occasional church folk, they even sang in the choir but I think their advanced age started making them less inclined to continue attending once I moved in with them, and when I questioned them about their beliefs, they had no problem admitting they didn't actually believe in any of it. It was purely social, but since the other people in the church were buying into it, they didn't socialize with them outside of church (which made perfect sense). So that was a nice thing, not living in a household where belief was held nor encouraged. Although at least one of their own grown-up kids' family gave their kids a religious upbringing which made me sad. None of them are really doing all that well, so that didn't seem to have the intended effect. Another one of their grown-up kids who died of cancer recently, after the initial diagnosis and during the nearly a decade's worth of remission before it came back and finished the job, became a very 'woo' sort of spiritualist which was terribly off-putting. Since I consider them family I didn't really bring it up but I never really saw them anyway so there wasn't much closeness.

I guess it was easy to come out to them, but that was basically the only place I could do that for years without hearing anyone else say "I don't want to hear it" or try to preach at me. Kind of ironic, when my real family of total fuck-ups and assholes failed, my foster family was the understanding one, but then that was like a small island in the middle of an ocean of zealots.

[KevinM1]

I'm pretty sure these questions were answered in your other almost identical threads.

Maybe, but I don't know if I should ever tell my parents or how should I tell them about my atheism. That's why I want to hear more from other experiences.

I have no idea how old you are, but if you're worried about their reaction then don't tell them until you're financially independent from them.

[The Industrial Atheist]

It went fine but my mom was probably used to it as we have many atheist/non religious people in our family. She was a little surprised, as I used to be super religous.