I just wanted to share the story of how i became an atheist, sorry it's kinda long but it's quite a unique story and i'm sure you will enjoy it and maybe find it amusing. Also i apologize for bad grammar
Ok so i grew up in a strict christian home and my father was a minister. I gave my life to jesus at a very young age and all throughout my childhood and teen years i was a very devout christian (no drinking, sex, cursing etc). I believed the bible word for word, so i believed the world was created in 7 days etc. I genuinely believed these things, there was no doubt in my mind that it was real, from a very young age it was my reality. As i grew up obviously i learnt about science and evolution at school but to me there was no conclusive evidence to prove the origins of life so i pushed all that to the side and focused on my faith. I guess you could say i clung to my faith and i felt safe with it, it answered my questions about life and gave me meaning. It was my identity.
Anyway when i left school i went to bible college with the intention of becoming a minister like my dad. I was very passionate about evangelism and in my fourth and final year a friend a i decided to evangelize to high school students. We would go to high schools during lunch time and invite anyone who was interested to learn, discuss or debate christianity. Although not many kids would turn up several actually became christians during our first few school visits and we had quite a few more that were interested. We also had a couple of semi heated debates about evolution/creationism and gay marriage to which we would say that evolution is not 100% fact and marriage is sacred and is a privilege not a right.
So on our 5th or 6th school visit we were visiting the same school for a second time. We surprisingly got a good turn out of about 15 kids of which about half were christian. I noticed one kid that had come to the last talk but had only sat there and said nothing, all he did was ask us at the end when and if we would be back. All i remember about him was that he was a junior and looked like he was about 12. Anyway after giving our rehearsed speech about why everyone should become christian we asked if anyone had any questions. He asked if he could debate us and of course we accepted. It was only then that i noticed that he had brought a lot of paper and a laptop with him.
He started by disproving our view of young earth creationism by providing us with overwhelming evidence of evolution and educating us about several very accurate dating methodologies that PROVE that the earth can't be 6000 years old. The evidence he provided us with was fact and was undeniable, there was nothing we could say. In less than 10 minutes he had disproved creationism (at least in the literal sense described in the bible) and our life long belief of the earth. As you can imagine this was quite a shock and also a huge embarrassment by being made to look like an idiot in front of all these kids. He then asked if we wanted to rebuttal and of course i wanted to say something really smart but there was nothing i could say, i was literally speechless. It was obvious to everyone that we were completely out of our depth.
When we said nothing he proceeded to tear the bible apart (not literally but he may as well have). He provided evidence that the bible was greatly inaccurate and unreliable. He showed that the authors were very unreliable (eg none of the authors of the gospels even met jesus) and the way the bible was 'formed' is very questionable. He also pointed out that my new living translation was a inaccurate translation of the bible that i claimed to believe in and that i had never even read the 'real bible'. He also pointed out many contradictions in the bible and also called the book of leviticus an abomination to mankind. Again he asked if we wanted to rebuttal but his argument was all facts and there was no denying it, i was speechless and very red faced again.
He then finished by providing evidence of the corruption, ignorance and hypocrisy of the church and christianity in general. He gave many situations of the negative affects christianity had and still has on the world through violence, bigotry and discrimination etc. He even pointed out that the head teacher of the bible college we attend was a high school drop out. He again asked if we wanted to rebuttal, which was met by silence. He had torn apart christianity to the point that it would take a nothing short of a retard could seriously claim that they believe in christianity. After a long pause with everyone staring at us my friend regrettably felt that he needed to say something and mumbled 'that still doesn't 100% percent disprove christianity...' which was met by disbelief and then uncontrollable fits of laughter by every the other atheist in the room. It was the most embarrassing and humiliating moment of my life it was even made worse by the fact that at the start i had said i would be willing to die for my religion.
He then went on to explain that the 2 main reasons for religion is ignorance and arrogance. Ignorance because even though all the evidence we need to confirm religion is no longer a feasible belief religion still exists because people ignore the evidence. And arrogance because people become stuck in their belief and way of life and refuse to admit when they are wrong even when they are confronted with unignorable (not sure it thats a real word) evidence. I know that the all this evidence is out there and its not the first time someone has brought up these points but the way the he constructed his argument and the examples he provided were perfect, he already knew what we were going to say from our last talk and all our points to argue against evolution etc and he got the evidence needed to prove every point in out argument wrong. I honestly wish someone had recorded it because he argued for atheism better than anyone ive ever heard, he nailed every point in less that half an hour. If there was a recording everyone should be made to watch it on there first day of school. He then asked the other students if anyone was still christian, to which no one replied. I think it is safe to assume that everyone left that room an atheist.
So needless to say that was the most humiliating and humbling experience of my life. When i arrived back at the bible college i just sat in my room for hours. I forced myself to admit the truth out loud, i confronted my beliefs and came to the conclusion that it was not true. It was probably the most difficult thing i have done which may sound stupid but it was a very quick process, it was not something that i had been contemplating for a long time. Its like when a bad relationship is coming to an end, you have time to deal with it and even though you don't want to admit it you know the inevitable ending. Except for me i had just been blindsided, dumped and heart broken, my life had been taken away if a matter of minutes. However after i had admitted it i felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I no longer had to live by faith, by the hope that they way i am living is based on truth and not a lie. In that moment i felt like i had to do something i wasn't allowed to do before, something fun and exciting as a way of starting my new life. I had never watched porn before and i thought why the hell not watch it now, i've got nothing holding me back. And to make it extra crazy i decided to watch lesbian porn, just because homosexuality is a 'sin'. Now i know this probably sounds lame but at that time i was a 21 year old guy who had only masturbated 2 times in my life (any i felt very guilty about it) and the last time was over 6 years ago. So my new found feeling our freedom coupled while uncontrollably masturbating to hot lesbian porn like a fiend was the most euphoric feeling in the world. The next day i left the bible college and started my new life, although the experience was kind of traumatic it was the best thing to happen to me. I am living a much happier and fulfilled life now and its all thanks to that kid, if it wasn't for him i might still be a christian.
The End
Ok so i grew up in a strict christian home and my father was a minister. I gave my life to jesus at a very young age and all throughout my childhood and teen years i was a very devout christian (no drinking, sex, cursing etc). I believed the bible word for word, so i believed the world was created in 7 days etc. I genuinely believed these things, there was no doubt in my mind that it was real, from a very young age it was my reality. As i grew up obviously i learnt about science and evolution at school but to me there was no conclusive evidence to prove the origins of life so i pushed all that to the side and focused on my faith. I guess you could say i clung to my faith and i felt safe with it, it answered my questions about life and gave me meaning. It was my identity.
Anyway when i left school i went to bible college with the intention of becoming a minister like my dad. I was very passionate about evangelism and in my fourth and final year a friend a i decided to evangelize to high school students. We would go to high schools during lunch time and invite anyone who was interested to learn, discuss or debate christianity. Although not many kids would turn up several actually became christians during our first few school visits and we had quite a few more that were interested. We also had a couple of semi heated debates about evolution/creationism and gay marriage to which we would say that evolution is not 100% fact and marriage is sacred and is a privilege not a right.
So on our 5th or 6th school visit we were visiting the same school for a second time. We surprisingly got a good turn out of about 15 kids of which about half were christian. I noticed one kid that had come to the last talk but had only sat there and said nothing, all he did was ask us at the end when and if we would be back. All i remember about him was that he was a junior and looked like he was about 12. Anyway after giving our rehearsed speech about why everyone should become christian we asked if anyone had any questions. He asked if he could debate us and of course we accepted. It was only then that i noticed that he had brought a lot of paper and a laptop with him.
He started by disproving our view of young earth creationism by providing us with overwhelming evidence of evolution and educating us about several very accurate dating methodologies that PROVE that the earth can't be 6000 years old. The evidence he provided us with was fact and was undeniable, there was nothing we could say. In less than 10 minutes he had disproved creationism (at least in the literal sense described in the bible) and our life long belief of the earth. As you can imagine this was quite a shock and also a huge embarrassment by being made to look like an idiot in front of all these kids. He then asked if we wanted to rebuttal and of course i wanted to say something really smart but there was nothing i could say, i was literally speechless. It was obvious to everyone that we were completely out of our depth.
When we said nothing he proceeded to tear the bible apart (not literally but he may as well have). He provided evidence that the bible was greatly inaccurate and unreliable. He showed that the authors were very unreliable (eg none of the authors of the gospels even met jesus) and the way the bible was 'formed' is very questionable. He also pointed out that my new living translation was a inaccurate translation of the bible that i claimed to believe in and that i had never even read the 'real bible'. He also pointed out many contradictions in the bible and also called the book of leviticus an abomination to mankind. Again he asked if we wanted to rebuttal but his argument was all facts and there was no denying it, i was speechless and very red faced again.
He then finished by providing evidence of the corruption, ignorance and hypocrisy of the church and christianity in general. He gave many situations of the negative affects christianity had and still has on the world through violence, bigotry and discrimination etc. He even pointed out that the head teacher of the bible college we attend was a high school drop out. He again asked if we wanted to rebuttal, which was met by silence. He had torn apart christianity to the point that it would take a nothing short of a retard could seriously claim that they believe in christianity. After a long pause with everyone staring at us my friend regrettably felt that he needed to say something and mumbled 'that still doesn't 100% percent disprove christianity...' which was met by disbelief and then uncontrollable fits of laughter by every the other atheist in the room. It was the most embarrassing and humiliating moment of my life it was even made worse by the fact that at the start i had said i would be willing to die for my religion.
He then went on to explain that the 2 main reasons for religion is ignorance and arrogance. Ignorance because even though all the evidence we need to confirm religion is no longer a feasible belief religion still exists because people ignore the evidence. And arrogance because people become stuck in their belief and way of life and refuse to admit when they are wrong even when they are confronted with unignorable (not sure it thats a real word) evidence. I know that the all this evidence is out there and its not the first time someone has brought up these points but the way the he constructed his argument and the examples he provided were perfect, he already knew what we were going to say from our last talk and all our points to argue against evolution etc and he got the evidence needed to prove every point in out argument wrong. I honestly wish someone had recorded it because he argued for atheism better than anyone ive ever heard, he nailed every point in less that half an hour. If there was a recording everyone should be made to watch it on there first day of school. He then asked the other students if anyone was still christian, to which no one replied. I think it is safe to assume that everyone left that room an atheist.
So needless to say that was the most humiliating and humbling experience of my life. When i arrived back at the bible college i just sat in my room for hours. I forced myself to admit the truth out loud, i confronted my beliefs and came to the conclusion that it was not true. It was probably the most difficult thing i have done which may sound stupid but it was a very quick process, it was not something that i had been contemplating for a long time. Its like when a bad relationship is coming to an end, you have time to deal with it and even though you don't want to admit it you know the inevitable ending. Except for me i had just been blindsided, dumped and heart broken, my life had been taken away if a matter of minutes. However after i had admitted it i felt like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I no longer had to live by faith, by the hope that they way i am living is based on truth and not a lie. In that moment i felt like i had to do something i wasn't allowed to do before, something fun and exciting as a way of starting my new life. I had never watched porn before and i thought why the hell not watch it now, i've got nothing holding me back. And to make it extra crazy i decided to watch lesbian porn, just because homosexuality is a 'sin'. Now i know this probably sounds lame but at that time i was a 21 year old guy who had only masturbated 2 times in my life (any i felt very guilty about it) and the last time was over 6 years ago. So my new found feeling our freedom coupled while uncontrollably masturbating to hot lesbian porn like a fiend was the most euphoric feeling in the world. The next day i left the bible college and started my new life, although the experience was kind of traumatic it was the best thing to happen to me. I am living a much happier and fulfilled life now and its all thanks to that kid, if it wasn't for him i might still be a christian.
The End
