(July 18, 2012 at 10:36 am)Stimbo Wrote: Never been religious, never felt the urge. Never really encountered this stuff until I got onto the internet (talk about a baptism of fire...)
As Ace mentioned, religion tends not to be much of a factor over here; particularly in the seventies when I was growing up. I'd say now that mine was an atheist family, but at the time it was never mentioned one way or the other; it was just something that never existed in my life. From an early age and encouraged by my parents, I developed a keen interest in backyard astronomy - even round here with a cluttered horizon and the light pollution typical of a town centre, which has increased badly in recent years I might add. Anyway, I learned to appreciate the beauty and the immense scale of the Universe, not the heavens. Gods and monsters need not apply.
I had the usual general religious education at Secondary School, which treated all religions as equally mythological and didn't even try to promote one over the others. Apart from that, plus my born-again schoolfriend who kept trying and failing to save me, that just about sums up my religious background. Until of course the internet provided me with a steady supply of live prey.
I can see no reason to be an active atheist(e.g. posting here) if religion has had no impact in your life.
