My somewhat deconversion
April 19, 2012 at 12:40 am
(This post was last modified: April 19, 2012 at 12:50 am by Tea Earl Grey Hot.)
Hello, I'm not sure if I'm an atheist yet, but I'm not really an agnostic, deist, theist, or pantheist/panentheist either. I'm undecided on the matter of deity and still need to ponder and investigate it further.
I grew up as a fundamentalist creationists Christian. I was also homeschooled completely from elementary to high school (I'm actually glad I was homeschooled though, even though I disagree now with some of what I was taught). A grew up thoroughly understanding, believing and defending my worldview. Must have spent hundreds of hours watching "seminars" of my favorite creation "scientists" over and over oblivious to the fact that most of them were simple frauds. Even went to a summer camp for two weeks once when I was teen that taught Christian apologetics through lectures for 10 hours a day.
I think what started my "deconversion" was reading evolutionist refutations of creationist arguments through sites such as TalkOrigins. For a while I explored the various Christian accommodation views that tried to fit in evolution such as the long-ages theory, gap theory, framework hypothesis, etc. None of them really satisfied me because but they didn't really seem to respect the intent of the Biblical text.
What finally did it though was reading New Testament criticism from scholars such as those associated with the Jesus Seminar. I was already aware of them from reading fundamentalist books that tried to refute their findings and theories. Now that I'm actually reading their work instead of criticisms of their work, I see that their arguments are much more convincing and strong than I had thought. Before, in my mind, I thought these people were hacks similar to Dan Brown, but now I see I was misled.
Historical credibility of the Bible was the last thing that was keeping me believing and now that has been mostly destroyed now in my mind I'm afraid.
I'm still not entirely convinced Christianity is false. I'd say I'm about 87.6 percent convinced it is false, but that little bit left is still nagging me so I have to keeping thinking and investigating.
I don't find atheism very appealing. I can't see yet how it just doesn't turn into nihilism. And the arguments I've seen, whether logical or evidential, against the existence of God I haven't found convincing yet. Though I have found atheistic criticisms of popular theistic arguments very enlightening.
I'm still of course thinking about these things, and who knows, I might just end up back as a Christian (I doubt that happening though).
I grew up as a fundamentalist creationists Christian. I was also homeschooled completely from elementary to high school (I'm actually glad I was homeschooled though, even though I disagree now with some of what I was taught). A grew up thoroughly understanding, believing and defending my worldview. Must have spent hundreds of hours watching "seminars" of my favorite creation "scientists" over and over oblivious to the fact that most of them were simple frauds. Even went to a summer camp for two weeks once when I was teen that taught Christian apologetics through lectures for 10 hours a day.
I think what started my "deconversion" was reading evolutionist refutations of creationist arguments through sites such as TalkOrigins. For a while I explored the various Christian accommodation views that tried to fit in evolution such as the long-ages theory, gap theory, framework hypothesis, etc. None of them really satisfied me because but they didn't really seem to respect the intent of the Biblical text.
What finally did it though was reading New Testament criticism from scholars such as those associated with the Jesus Seminar. I was already aware of them from reading fundamentalist books that tried to refute their findings and theories. Now that I'm actually reading their work instead of criticisms of their work, I see that their arguments are much more convincing and strong than I had thought. Before, in my mind, I thought these people were hacks similar to Dan Brown, but now I see I was misled.
Historical credibility of the Bible was the last thing that was keeping me believing and now that has been mostly destroyed now in my mind I'm afraid.
I'm still not entirely convinced Christianity is false. I'd say I'm about 87.6 percent convinced it is false, but that little bit left is still nagging me so I have to keeping thinking and investigating.
I don't find atheism very appealing. I can't see yet how it just doesn't turn into nihilism. And the arguments I've seen, whether logical or evidential, against the existence of God I haven't found convincing yet. Though I have found atheistic criticisms of popular theistic arguments very enlightening.
I'm still of course thinking about these things, and who knows, I might just end up back as a Christian (I doubt that happening though).
My ignore list
"The lord doesn't work in mysterious ways, but in ways that are indistinguishable from his nonexistence."
-- George Yorgo Veenhuyzen quoted by John W. Loftus in The End of Christianity (p. 103).
"The lord doesn't work in mysterious ways, but in ways that are indistinguishable from his nonexistence."
-- George Yorgo Veenhuyzen quoted by John W. Loftus in The End of Christianity (p. 103).
