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Deconverted Overnight
#1
Deconverted Overnight
I know that most atheist who come from a religious background have taken a long time to come to the conclusion that there is no god; some have taken months, some have taken years, but I am one who deconverted over the span of one day. Before I explain my deconversion story, I should explain what kind of christian changes sides so quickly. My parents are catholic and so I was raised catholic as well (surprising isn't it?). My mother made sure my brothers and I were in the pews every Sunday and even on church holy days (Ash Wednesday, Good Friday, etc.); she even sent us to church school, not to be confused with christian private schools, this was just a hour long class every Wednesday afternoon for children at church. However, my parents didn't have any quarrels with science; they accepted that the world is billions of years old and that we did in fact evolve. If I had to guess why, it might be they don't take Genesis literally; I certainly didn't. I was quite the opposite actually. I loved science, loved dinosaurs, and I loved astronomy. Everyday, I would try to learn more about how the universe works. So when it came to stuff in Christianity, I approached it scientifically as best I could. I would think to myself, "Well this Genesis story doesn't match what we actually know about the origins of the earth, this must be figurative. 'Let there be light' is when the Big Bang happened." or I would think, "Well God couldn't have made us in his actual image, that would mean He's an ape. We must be made in his spiritual image instead." or I would think, "Well maybe God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit are one the same way ice, water, and water vapor are all the same thing." Yes, I compared the holy trinity to the three states of matter; it all sounds ridiculous, but that was just me hypothesizing how what I knew about Christianity fit with what I knew about everything else. I had this cog that I was trying to fit into this machine that was my model of reality. Every now and then I had to move this cog around to keep this machine working.

Years passed and I became an adult. I voted for the first time in the 2012 elections, but I felt unease voting republican just because my parents vote republican (looking back now I'm glad Mitt Romney didn't win). Here I was, in the voting booth, giving the Office of the President of the United States to a guy I barely knew. I promised myself next time I would get to know my candidates before I voted. So 2015 rolled along and the candidates presented themselves, and I started following youtube channels that talked about politics. It was around this time I found out there are other people out there who take Genesis literally. That's right I discovered creationists on the internet, and I found them so amusing. "These idiots aren't suppose to take Genesis literally," I thought, "Billions of years are like a day to God, and Noah's flood is a greatly exaggerated story about how a man saved his family and his livestock from a large localized flood. It was exaggerated to such epic proportions to serve more as a story with a symbolic meaning." (I was quite the mental gymnast if I do say so myself). So I kept watching these idiots get Christianity so wrong (or so I thought). I watched Bill Nye destroy Ken Ham in a debate and at the end of it I cheered Bill (while still believing in God, Jesus, heaven, and hell) because it's true what atheist say, evolution has nothing to do with whether there is a god or not. During this time, I came across this youtube channel called potholer54 where the guy brilliantly destroys creationist arguments (you should subscribe to him if you haven't already). More importantly, I loved how he detroyed them. In each case he defeats them at their source. He searches for where they get their ridiculous claim and he exposes that the claim has no evidence and rather was pulled out of their asses. He shows that to truly know something is true and not some false claim, you follow the evidence wherever it leads. It's something I took to heart still as a christian, but I hadn't yet put two and two together.

So here comes the deconversion part of my story. One day, I was watching a video on one of those political channels I mentioned earlier. Specifically the channel is called Secular Talk, and specifically the video is called "A look Inside Creepy Christian Textbooks" (link below), and specifically it's the second picture at 1:40 in the video that I saw that made me realize that Christianity was used to indoctrinate people into obedience. It sickened me. And my second thought was "Well, how do I know I wasn't indoctrinated?" The answer quickly dawned on me "I was." I immediately stood up because my head was racing with thoughts. I took a step while thinking how I could separate truth from fiction. I took another step while thinking back to potholer and how the evidence leads to the truth. I took another step while thinking of all the evidence Christianity had. I stopped. . . and curled into the fetal position when I realized there wasn't any. I can't describe the emotion I felt. I don't think there is a name for it but I felt it. It is the emotion you feel when you realize your world isn't real. It is the emotion you feel when you realize you're the prisoner in Plato's story who thought the world was just shadows until he left the cave. It is an emotion filled with shock, disbelief, anger, and yet acceptance. I fell down as a christian, but I rose as an atheist. 

Thank you for reading my story.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hnbf3ATobCY&t=101s
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#2
RE: Deconverted Overnight
Cool story.
Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own - Bertrand Russell
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#3
RE: Deconverted Overnight
I love secular talk
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#4
RE: Deconverted Overnight
Ah, dammit. The mods deleted the preachy troll post between mine and the OP. Now it looks like that was my response to this user's conversion story.
Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own - Bertrand Russell
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#5
RE: Deconverted Overnight
Brian, give us an update.
How's the folks, friends, life, etc, since restoring full power to the warp core?
No God, No fear.
Know God, Know fear.
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#6
RE: Deconverted Overnight
(February 8, 2017 at 8:50 pm)Faith No More Wrote: Ah, dammit.  The mods deleted the preachy troll post between mine and the OP.  Now it looks like that was my response to this user's conversion story.

Sometimes they're just too fast.
Dying to live, living to die.
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#7
RE: Deconverted Overnight
(February 8, 2017 at 10:29 pm)The Valkyrie Wrote: Sometimes they're just too fast.

That's what she said.

*rimshot*

(I'll get my coat...)
Even if the open windows of science at first make us shiver after the cozy indoor warmth of traditional humanizing myths, in the end the fresh air brings vigor, and the great spaces have a splendor of their own - Bertrand Russell
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#8
RE: Deconverted Overnight
(February 8, 2017 at 10:34 pm)Faith No More Wrote:
(February 8, 2017 at 10:29 pm)The Valkyrie Wrote: Sometimes they're just too fast.

That's what she said.

*rimshot*

(I'll get my coat...)


This is almost the exact conversation I had with a certain someone in the report thread for that spammer!

deja vu...

...again!
Dying to live, living to die.
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#9
RE: Deconverted Overnight
I enjoyed your story Smile Thank you for sharing. I can relate very much to the feeling you had when you realized your world wasn't real. I remember when I experienced that. It was inexplicable.
"Hipster is what happens when young hot people do what old ladies do." -Exian
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#10
RE: Deconverted Overnight
Welcome aboard.  Do you think that the episode of secular talk might have been more of a catalyst for a creeping or dormant realization than the origin of the same?  When you describe your experience with creationism it seems as if you may have already been a doubter, or am I misreading?
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