Atheism program

[JayWalker]

12 Steps

1. Am I sure? (Doubt)
2. Why? (gaining reason)
3. Comparing belief vs disbelief?
4. Hating that you no longer believe.
5. Trying to hide it.
6. Anger at faith.
7. Doubt (atheism)
8. Agnostic
9. Realization
10. Acceptance

[Lek]

12 Steps

1. Am I sure? (Doubt)
2. Why? (gaining reason)
3. Comparing belief vs disbelief?
4. Hating that you no longer believe.
5. Trying to hide it.
6. Anger at faith.
7. Doubt (atheism)
8. Agnostic
9. Realization
10. Acceptance

11. Disillusionment
12. Anger
14. Hopelessness and Despair
15. Death

[Rampant.A.I.]

12 Steps

1. Am I sure? (Doubt)
2. Why? (gaining reason)
3. Comparing belief vs disbelief?
4. Hating that you no longer believe.
5. Trying to hide it.
6. Anger at faith.
7. Doubt (atheism)
8. Agnostic
9. Realization
10. Acceptance

11. Disillusionment
12. Anger
14. Hopelessness and Despair
15. Death

Don't project your fear of the dark and need for Santa Claus to be real onto everyone else.

[DarkHorse]

12 Steps

1. Am I sure? (Doubt)
2. Why? (gaining reason)
3. Comparing belief vs disbelief?
4. Hating that you no longer believe.
5. Trying to hide it.
6. Anger at faith.
7. Doubt (atheism)
8. Agnostic
9. Realization
10. Acceptance

11. Disillusionment
12. Anger
14. Hopelessness and Despair
15. Death

Nope, those are yours.

[Esquilax]

11. Disillusionment
12. Anger
14. Hopelessness and Despair
15. Death

I was planning on asking if it was fun in your fantasyland, but then I remembered you're a christian, so you don't have any familiarity with reality in order to make a comparison.

[Brakeman]

11. Disillusionment
12. Anger
14. Hopelessness and Despair
15. Death

"Disillusionment??" How is Disillusionment not a good thing? Don't you LIKE finding out the truth about things?

"Hopelessness and despair," this imparts an element of peril. From what are we supposed to be so afraid of? To what aspiration are we supposed to be in despair of never meeting? This is why the christian god story created the "hell" and "heaven." It needed to create an imaginary fear, Hell, and an imaginary reward, heaven, in order to create a hopelessness and despair to "save" the gullible from.

Once you grasp that it's ALL just a silly story, you simply get on with your life, without the fear and despair of imagined punishments.

[RobbyPants]

Similar to others, I think I progressed:

Christian > doubting Christian > angry Christian > almost atheist still scared of hell > comfortable atheist

So is their like a 12 step program or a stages of grief thing for new atheists.


Stage one seems to be Disillusionment.

I actually didn't go through much of a disillusioned stage. I spent my final death throes of theism getting increasingly angry at a god that would allow this world and getting increasingly sick of standard apologetics. Once I got to the point I realized I didn't believe in God, there was this lingering doubt that I was failing a test or something, and that I'd go to hell for apostasy. That kept me from admitting to myself that I was atheist for a good six months.

Once I got comfortable with it and stopped worrying about hell, the biggest thing was how I would occasionally have a knee-jerk reaction to any particular thing, then realize that the stance was rooted in previously-held Christian beliefs, and then I'd have to reevaluate how I felt about the matter.

[Tonus]

Disillusionment and anger are understandable, once a person realizes how religion may have impacted his life negatively. And some are bound to despair if they have trouble dealing with the truth of their mortality. Most people seem to get by just fine, though, because in spite of religious indoctrination most people live their lives as if it's the only one they have and only offer lip service to religious beliefs. When those people become atheists, their lives change very little unless their religious friends or family ostracize them or find other ways to make their lives difficult.

As for death, well... yeah. That's pretty much how it ends for everyone.

[Elskidor]

There should be more recovering addict support groups that don't revolve around the religeous AA cult. It is pathetic that there isn't more available, but I'm glad it was ruled unconstitutional for a judge to order someone to attend AA meetings.