The music destroyed my dogma.

[drfuzzy]

That should have read "my karma ran over my dogma" but I just couldn't get a musical term to fit.  Maybe some of you witty folk will solve that puzzle.  

This is a little different from some of the other de-conversion tales at AF - and that's why I thought that I would share.  Multiple factors led to my deconversion, such as a love of Scientific American magazine.  But I have been a choir accompanist for decades, and a huge part of my story is the cognitive dissonance between what I hear in lyrics vs. logic.  Here is an example for the amusement of my AF friends.

Just 4 songs from choir practice 9/23/2015  (snarky piano player thoughts in italics)

Warm up was a very quiet, slow song.  The director said, "now think about the words.  Don't just sing notes, BEG  - PLEAD."
1) It's three minutes of "please oh please let me know you are there".  The song has these lines: 

My Jesus grant that I may know 
The presence of your love
Show me what I don't know
I'm desperate for your presence
Longing to be with you
Here I will wait
Just for a glimpse of you, God

Note that not a single person spoke up to say "this is silly, I know Jesus is with me all the time, I don't need to beg."

2) Then the very next song said this: 

Morning by morning I wake up to find
The power and comfort of Gods hand in mine
Season by season I watch Him, amazed
In awe of the mystery of His perfect ways

Well, first they beg for even a hint that he's around, and now they're waking up holding hands with god and watching him work every day.  Am I really the only person in the room who noticed this?  I am.  

3) Next hymn has this line: 
"I, your Lord and Master, now become your servant, I, who made the moon and stars will kneel to wash your feet"

Sure, it goes on about how if GOD is willing to be our servant, we should serve others.  But that one line just sums up why we HAVE xtians.  They KNOW that they are SPECIAL.  The creator of the universe is not only their Father, he's their personal servant, therapist, santa claus, and the guy who finds their car keys for them.

4) Then a re-working of a negro spiritual that was popular during Civil Rights rallies in the 1960's: 

"I'm gonna sit at the Welcome Table"  "I'm gonna share a cup with Jesus, oh lord" "I'm gonna sing with the heavenly . . . cho - ir! (pronounced kwai - YER!)  Catholic choirs are fun. The guys pass around the Maker's Mark, and they get louder and more cheerful as the evening goes on.

SO many of these songs say "I" SO many times.  Me, me, me - it is so unbelievably egotistical.  And they're celebrating things in the afterlife, --- nobody can prove there is one, but it doesn't stop them from singing enthusiastically about getting everything they have ever dreamed of for all eternity.

These are very intelligent people.  Lawyers, CEO's, doctors, nurses, teachers.  They are very nice people, I like them.  But they sing this stuff with gusto and they don't hear what I'm hearing.  It makes the one person in the room who is trying to be rational feel - insane.

Take just the choir practices for 25 years, with a mindset of "what the f*ck did they just sing?" and yeah . . . you probably get an atheist.  That's how I got this way.

[brewer]

If your church choir is anything like my old one or the school choir, they are paying very little attention to the words. Just want to hit the notes and not have the others near them make faces. Like you, they're there to sing and play. My dad was like that. Didn't care if it was "Hallelujah" or "Suck it god" just don't let him be off key.

[brewer]

Have them sing this one. Give all your minds a break.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t8tdmaEhMHE

[TheoneandonlytrueGod]

If your church choir is anything like my old one or the school choir, they are paying very little attention to the words. Just want to hit the notes and not have the others near them make faces. Like you, they're there to sing and play. My dad was like that. Didn't care if it was "Hallelujah" or "Suck it god" just don't let him be off key.

I'm with you. I love the simple tunes used in church services but never payed much attention to the words or what they were supposed to mean. I used to sing in a large choir in college and always wanted to sing in (can't remember just now, I'm having a senior moment). Again I loved the music and sang because of it and again couldn't have cared about the words except to pronounce them correctly and in tune.

[Alex K]

I was a member of a de facto catholic choir for a few years now and feel with you