Hostage to fear

[Spacetime]

Well, if you haven't, see this:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r6w2M50_Xdk

Holy. Shit.

Thank you for that.

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Fear very often -is- entirely irrational.  Knowing that doesn't make it less fearful.  That mostly has to do with fear being an actual thing, an electro-chemical cocktail  with effects which do not depend upon your knowledge of them -or- their nature.   Fear is autonomous.  

There's no reason that your god can't be the being that you want him to be, btw.  I don't see the holdup, the gods you've heard about are all the way they are because -someone- wanted them to be that way....yours wouldn't be any different on that count.

Preach a hippy christ to your family, man.  Preach a hell-less afterlife.  I don't really think that the church can be given credit for your families happiness...but if that -is- the case then maybe you should work to tip the scales....maybe- you- should endeavor to bring more happiness to your family?  Truth be told...you can;t really keep the church in any of their lives in any case.  They could just fall away (as many do) and if the church is their source of happiness...then what?  You can;t do anything about that potentiality, but you can at least bring some other source of happiness into their lives to hedge against the fear which clearly consumes your thoughts on this issue.

You're right about the sting of this sort of irrational fear.  I've never felt so uncomfortable as I do right now, at this moment.

And you're exactly right on the point of my god being the thing I want it to be.

I don't suppose the Church is what has made them happy, but it will certainly be difficult to compete with it.  But I should, as you said, endeavor to.

Thank you for your reply!

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My own Grandmother threatened me with hell.  A girl I liked in high school... I asked her "So if I don't believe in Jesus, but am a good person, I'm still going to go to hell?"  When she said "I'm sorry, but yes."  I literally burst into tears in art class.

I wonder how god feels at seeing her apologize for him.  I'll bet he's pretty pissed, and probably even moved her name from the "heaven" list to the "don't piss off god, you stupid cunt" list.

lol ... she was this perfect, permed, and primped thing every boy wanted.  I think I even had a chance, until I burst into tears like a bitch.

I needed that laugh.  Thanks!

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You should definitely read things on the subject, as it will help you have greater confidence in your ideas about there not being a god, and in the absurdity of Christianity.  What would be best depends on your temperament and so forth, so I am hesitant to make any specific recommendations.  Do your atheist parents have any suggestions, or do you not wish to talk with them about this for some reason?

And welcome to the forum!

Unfortunately, they are my only personal experience with atheists, and they are very bad ones at that.

If I tried to talk to them about it, there would be "told you so" moments that would make this thing so much more difficult than it already is.

Thank you!

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Hello, welcome

I'm very sorry to hear what you've been through, and are going through. For what it's worth I can confirm that religion is bullshit, and hell is a man-made concept to bully people into compliance. [There is absolutely no evidence to the contrary]

It's normal for the sting and the fear to remain for a while, but it usually does fade in time. Consider how much time you've spent worrying about other gods judging you, and other possible "hells"? Most likely no time at all because you know they are made up, and this is no different.

I firmly believe there is nothing religion offers that cannot be achieved through other means. Deciding how to talk to others about it is very difficult, if it's any use I have a bit on my website with a few ideas here.

I've lived my life entirely in fear of this concept of being "outside of God's grace".  Like most men, I'm a fixer.  Show me the problem, I'll fix it.  The problem with Christianity is, you can't do that.  It doesn't fix anything.  It only confuses your problems further.  Once I ditched the doctrine of "once saved, always saved", I had to accept that I could do things to lose my salvation.  Holy crap, what a bad thing to have over your head.  It turned me into a heavy drinker and sent me into the worst depression, because I struggle to meet God's standards.  And the doctrine of the Church is always there to make you feel so fucking horrible about yourself.

It makes me wonder if I can live a more holy life, if I didn't have this thing hovering over me making me want to sin to self-medicate my depression that the thing itself has caused.

I don't know when or where, but I have sort of made myself promise to talk to my wife about this soon.  Maybe she'll be down with sleeping in on Sundays. 

Thank you so much!