Hello

[jcvamp]

Hi, I'm jcvamp. I'm a 30-year-old male living in north-east England. I was raised Christian, and even did Bible studies and was a Junior Soldier in the Salvation Army. I stopped believing in Christianity in my mid-teens. The more I read the Bible, the less I believed. I was a Pagan from my late teens until my early 20s, and I went through a phase of trying to define my own beliefs. The more I examined my beliefs, the less religious they became, until I ended up realising that I didn't believe in any kind of deity. Once I recognised that I didn't have religious beliefs, and that I was spending a lot of time trying to rationalise what I wanted to be true, everything clicked and started making sense.

I used to debate (or argue) Christians online, and ended up causing issues with Christian friends and family members. I now try to practise restraint. I've come here so that I can discuss my ideas freely without having to debate people who don't want to debate, and without friends and family telling me that expressing my views is disrespectful to their religion. I have nothing against religious people in general, though I disagree with their reasoning. My honest belief is that a person decides their own morality, and that their religious beliefs reflect that. Religious people acknowledge the parts of the religion that they believe and either ignore or excuse those that they don't.

Personally, I believe that logic and the scientific method are the best way for us to learn about the universe.

[Minimalist]

The more I read the Bible, the less I believed.

It does have that impact.  Welcome aboard.

[robvalue]

Hey there! Welcome do the forum Thanks for sharing your story.

It sounds like you've come to the right place! Religion is bollocks, you'll get no argument out of us

I agree, logic and science FTW! This notion that faith picks up where science leaves off is the kind of fuzzy thinking that religion preys upon.

[rexbeccarox]

Welcome

[The Valkyrie]

Welcome from a land down under.

[jcvamp]

Thanks for the welcomes.

[atheistinNYC]

I feel you-I had a family member "disown" me last easter for posting a joke about Jesus being as real as the Easter bunny. He told me he was going to pray for me. haha

[jcvamp]

I feel you-I had a family member "disown" me last easter for posting a joke about Jesus being as real as the Easter bunny. He told me he was going to pray for me. haha

Luckily, the Christian family members who were pissed off at me don't talk to me much anyway. I have had two family members stop talking to me because of me being an atheist. It was because I'd posted about harvesting blood from horseshoe crabs, and I said I disagreed with it, because the crabs often die because of it, and my cousin replied something along the lines of, 'You preach science, but you're quick to post when you disagree with it.' I replied that 1, I don't preach science, 2, it's not a religion and you don't need to follow it without question, and 3, I'll post about anything I disagree with. It ended up turning into a stupid argument and his brother joined in, and I ended up blocking both of them.

When I tried to contact them a while later to apologise for the fact that I'd argued back (it got quite uncivil, and I don't like to debate that way), they said they were going to block me anyway, and never to talk to them again.