I was born into Catholicism. It's the norm in my group.
Back then I didn't think much about it. It was more of a fact of life. Something taken for granted.
I was actually baptized later in life. I was around seven or eight. I remember going into a church that I had never stepped in beforehand and have not since. I remember standing at the altar with a variety of different candidates. I remember a tired old priest who mumbled something while splashing water on my forehead. I received some sort of prayerbook from my Sunday school teacher that night. I think I've only cracked it open once or twice.
When I was around ten or so I had an episode of stealing things. I would steal kids toys, money, video game cartridges. I even recall stealing dollar bills from someones religious altar at home. I remember worrying about the implications of committing sins against got but nothing ever happened to me so it boosted my confidence. What is interesting is what made me stop. I looked introspectively and asked myself how I would feel if someone stole from me. I haven't stolen anything since and even make the effort to return items if I can.
Thirteen was a tumultuous time for me. I was going through puberty and I started liking girls. That was also the time when my faith started to become firmer. I went through confirmation and an intensive retreat where my group of young Catholics went to a distant seminary. But again that was also the time where I started becoming an individual and started to define my likes and dislikes such as rock music.
Eventually I graduated highschool and my theist beliefs actually became even stronger. I had friends online who were devoted Christians and I joined their forums. I started having religious conversations about them that were pretty intimate. I remember crying because of Catholic guilt that was spurred up by a religious conversation. I also started trying to logically prove god. I remember even looking for websites that would side with my biases such as a website that argued that dinosaurs were in fact in the bible.
One of my first courses in college was intro to anthropology which introduced earlier hominids. I knew this course was going to be based on evolution and I somehow wanted to learn about it just so I can disprove it. I ended up agreeing with what I learned.
I think the final nail in the coffin for my Catholicism was when I learned how social structures worked and how religion was just an institution to enforce ideologies and make things like racism, monarchies, etc accepted.
I think from that point on I was a Deist. I accepted most of science but I still couldn't let go of god. As a slew of things kept opening up my mind such as music, politics, and social movements I started to label myself as an agnostic.
Then about a year ago someone explained exactly what the Atheistic stance was and that it was merely a rejection of Theistic claims and did not conflict with Agnosticism. At that point I became Atheist and all the fear that haunted me during my childhood years went away.
Back then I didn't think much about it. It was more of a fact of life. Something taken for granted.
I was actually baptized later in life. I was around seven or eight. I remember going into a church that I had never stepped in beforehand and have not since. I remember standing at the altar with a variety of different candidates. I remember a tired old priest who mumbled something while splashing water on my forehead. I received some sort of prayerbook from my Sunday school teacher that night. I think I've only cracked it open once or twice.
When I was around ten or so I had an episode of stealing things. I would steal kids toys, money, video game cartridges. I even recall stealing dollar bills from someones religious altar at home. I remember worrying about the implications of committing sins against got but nothing ever happened to me so it boosted my confidence. What is interesting is what made me stop. I looked introspectively and asked myself how I would feel if someone stole from me. I haven't stolen anything since and even make the effort to return items if I can.
Thirteen was a tumultuous time for me. I was going through puberty and I started liking girls. That was also the time when my faith started to become firmer. I went through confirmation and an intensive retreat where my group of young Catholics went to a distant seminary. But again that was also the time where I started becoming an individual and started to define my likes and dislikes such as rock music.
Eventually I graduated highschool and my theist beliefs actually became even stronger. I had friends online who were devoted Christians and I joined their forums. I started having religious conversations about them that were pretty intimate. I remember crying because of Catholic guilt that was spurred up by a religious conversation. I also started trying to logically prove god. I remember even looking for websites that would side with my biases such as a website that argued that dinosaurs were in fact in the bible.
One of my first courses in college was intro to anthropology which introduced earlier hominids. I knew this course was going to be based on evolution and I somehow wanted to learn about it just so I can disprove it. I ended up agreeing with what I learned.
I think the final nail in the coffin for my Catholicism was when I learned how social structures worked and how religion was just an institution to enforce ideologies and make things like racism, monarchies, etc accepted.
I think from that point on I was a Deist. I accepted most of science but I still couldn't let go of god. As a slew of things kept opening up my mind such as music, politics, and social movements I started to label myself as an agnostic.
Then about a year ago someone explained exactly what the Atheistic stance was and that it was merely a rejection of Theistic claims and did not conflict with Agnosticism. At that point I became Atheist and all the fear that haunted me during my childhood years went away.
