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How I became a non-believer
#1
How I became a non-believer
As I said in my introduction, I was raised Pentecostal. My grandfather pastored a church, my family attended church three times per week. After I turned 10 or so I grew more and more aware of how hypocritical my family was concerning religion. They would pick and choose. Pentecostals put a high value on appearance, and it seemed to me that at least the people I was surrounded by valued that far more than things like decency, compassion, honesty, and empathy. They regarded people not included in their denomination as outsiders, and thusly, sinners.

It became more apparent as I became a teenager that there was something inherently wrong with this belief system. I was the kid in sunday school that got laughed at for asking questions like, why were biblical prophecies so vague, how could someone living thousands of years ago possibly have comprehended modern technology like guns and airplanes. Instead of giving me credible answers, they gave me regurgitated responses like god being the inspiration for prophecies.

As I began to read secular books and listen to secular speakers, I began having more complex questions regarding subjects such as astronomy and paleontolgy, and again, I was given the same regurgitated answers over and over, all the while being mocked for questioning. All this time I began to see how miserable most of my family was, even with this "truth". And it seemed to me that there had to be more to it than this. I officially quit attending church at the age of 16, but I had lost my belief in the ideologies before that. The holes in christian doctrine, and the holes in the morality that were held in such high regard by the believers became overwhelming.

Since that time I have become deeply immersed in philosophy, i've researched the history of modern religions, and ancient religions alike. And in the midst of all this information, I came to the realization that every religion that has ever existed has followed the same basic formulas, and answered the same basic questions. During that epiphany it occurred to me that quite possibly the reasons for the documented thousands of years that religion has existed were simple. In a time before we knew anything of biology, anything of physics, all branches of science outside of primitive astronomy deities filled in the blanks. I surmised that god/s were created to answer questions that we had begun to ask. And at last it all made sense. All of the common threads connecting monotheistic religions like christianity and islam, to polytheistic religions like norse and greek mythology shared the common goal of giving us answers before we knew how to find them.

For a long time I was angry, angry at my parents, angry at my extended family, angry at the preachers and teachers that had for so long enslaved me to a set way of thinking. So I became aggressive, I researched christianity with the sole purpose of dismantling everyone who believed. And before I knew it I had caused the same heartbreak on my parents that I believed they had caused me all those years before. I'm 27 now, and i've mellowed out a lot since then. I'm still viciously offensive concerning certain subjects like religion in government and the saturation of the American culture with christian idealogies and complete disregard for anyone outside of that group. However I have relieved myself to becoming more pro-active in support of athiesm, being less confrontational and more obliged to adult conversation than pointless dueling.

So there's my story in a nutshell, a rather large, blog like novel of a nutshell. Smile
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#2
RE: How I became a non-believer
Your opening paragraph reminded me of this quotation from Benjamin Franklin.

Quote:"The faith you mention has doubtless its use in the world. I do not desire to see it diminished, nor would I desire to lessen it in any way; but I wish it were more productive of good works than I have generally seen it. I mean real good works, works of kindness, charity, mercy, and public spirit, not holy-day keeping, sermon-hearing, and reading, performing church ceremonies, or making long prayers, filled with flatteries and compliments, despised even by wise men, and much less capable of pleasing the Deity"

[Benjamin Franklin, 1753


There are worse people in history to with whom to find oneself in agreement.
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#3
RE: How I became a non-believer
(April 17, 2010 at 2:14 am)Minimalist Wrote: Your opening paragraph reminded me of this quotation from Benjamin Franklin.

Quote:"The faith you mention has doubtless its use in the world. I do not desire to see it diminished, nor would I desire to lessen it in any way; but I wish it were more productive of good works than I have generally seen it. I mean real good works, works of kindness, charity, mercy, and public spirit, not holy-day keeping, sermon-hearing, and reading, performing church ceremonies, or making long prayers, filled with flatteries and compliments, despised even by wise men, and much less capable of pleasing the Deity"

[Benjamin Franklin, 1753


There are worse people in history to with whom to find oneself in agreement.

wouldn't saying 'there are worse people in history to agree with" be easier than " bla bla to with whom to find oneself in agreement"
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#4
RE: How I became a non-believer
Nice story SD. I find your reasoning flawed where you base it on religion needing to answer questions of science, as religion is exactly not ever about that. Then there are issues with people who blatantly get it wrong, as people do. I'd probably be in agreement with you on the involvement of religion in secular life where it doesn't belong.
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#5
RE: How I became a non-believer
Personally I think religion should be a philisophical explanation, but unfortunately with the sheer amount of fanatics out there attempting to debunk proven science and scientific theory using the bible, they are clearly making christian idealogy a substitute for science. Chuck Missler is one of the many fanatically delusional people attempting to do so. Smile
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#6
RE: How I became a non-believer
Agreed
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#7
RE: How I became a non-believer
Wouldn't the early polytheistic religions having a god for everything in their lives prove my reasoning correct? Most religions have some story of creation, most have explanations for natural disasters and the like, it seems to fit that these were primitive explanations to social and scientific questions.
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#8
RE: How I became a non-believer
I don't think so. Though I certainly couldn't disagree that it has figured quite a lot. I think there's always been the trip offroad into areas which never were in the realm of philosophical and theological thought. People exploiting that/ making a living from it (As soon as humans could support people not working directly to feed themselves there were prostitutes and vicars).
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