Why do you hate God?

[Brian37]

Since people are doing their testimony, I'll go ahead.

I was raised entirely without religion. I grew up in a tiny town with a church on every corner, but my parents were indifferent to it. I have never attended a church service, or even a church wedding or funeral. At the first opportunity I left the small town, and after that I was always in the art world or in academic circles, where it is more common to be an atheist. A demonstrative and practicing religious person would be seen as odd in that world.

Since I never had to reject a Christian upbringing, it has allowed me to learn from the best theological thinkers without getting worked up about talking snakes.

On this forum, an atheist is defined as someone who lacks a belief in God. So it's no problem to lack that belief while also not falling into the belief system on the other side, in which religious people are condemned as unthinking followers, judged in contrast to our own group of superior thinkers.

Thank you for giving us your story I really appreciate it. 

If I may ask, what theologians do you read or follow? What have you taken from what they have written or talked about if anything?

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You can see from the responses so far, that people who were raised Christian and became atheist still think in terms of sola scriptura literalism.

That is, they can't conceive of mythical writing or allegory as anything other than literal truth. Nor are they aware of how many important Christians in history reject sola scriptura literalism. 

This is why I think so many atheists left their church at about age 12 and stopped learning anything about it from then on. Their conception of Christian belief is that of a 12-year-old. This is then reinforced by poorly-informed people like Hitchens, who has led many sheeple astray.

Wow, very interesting analysis. I am surprised to hear an atheist say that about Hitchens. I have always found him to be quite interesting myself, at least on his outlook on religion. I always thought his story about the Navy captain and the wind analogy intriguing and funny. It is unfortunate he passed so early, I would love to have gone to one of his lectures.

That isn't an "interesting analysis" of Hitchens, it is patently absurd. Hitchens is extremely well educated. On can only argue his bluntness can turn off even some atheists, but to claim he has a 12 year old's  understanding of religion is laughable. Hitchens has a very deep understanding of the world's religions, not just Christianity.