Religious Background

[Der/die AtheistIn]

Hello, I'm a girl from Romania (a country from East Europe), which is a pretty religious country. Most people are orthodhox christians, I used to be myself.
In Romania religion is OBLIGATORY teached in schools. Ok, not obligatory... if you get grades from other place. At the very least I think so, sorry if I'm misleading, this country's system is bullshit, it's hard for me to get it.
Anyway, so I started learning religion in first grade (Religion is taught from first to twelfth grade). My teacher taught us about the Bible, about how god created Adam and Eve, about how God loves us so much that he can send us to Hell etc.
I, as a stupid kid believed all of that. Then in middle school (just so you know, in Romania it starts at fifth grade) I had a different teacher. She, like the other one, thaught pretty much the same things. 
One day (in the seventh grade) I was alone with a friend from my father. I told him something we learned at religion class, and he told me that I shouldn't believe that. He was a christian, he just didn't believe in the Old Testament or in hell. 
I was really mad, I tought that my family and friends were brainwashed too (I still think that, but to a lesser level). The fact that an oncle of mine is a priest didn't help. In the eight grade I told my parents that I don't want to go to church anymore and that I want only to pray at home. They didn't understand me so I started to scream. In the end they convinced me that they don't believe in hell, nor do they think that atheists are bad. They only go to church because of positive energy. I calmed myself down and I countinued to belive in Jesus.
But something still felt, I was somethings thinking uncontrollable swear words about the Bible, Jesus and saints. I told this my mother one day and she replied to me that thoughts like that can appear and that I need to think at something else.
I discovered DarkMatter2525 on YouTube and really liked his videos (still a fan by the way!), and with time I become an agnostic theist.
In the eight grade our teacher showed us the movie God's not Dead and I kind of liked it. Years later I looked at the reviews and wondered why it was so hated by critics. I saw a review of this movie on YouTube and than it hit me. I didn't get why it was so bad at first, because I was still brainwashed! That was the last drop!
I was so tented to become an atheist so i looked on arguments for atheism and liked how logical they were. I watched videos from Tj Kirk and Cult of Dusty and some other atheist youtubers. I even started to listen to atheist music.
I didn't tell my family that I'm atheist, I only told my mother that I'm agnostic and she accepted it. She said that I'm free to think what I want!
Though she still encourages me to pray and when my family goes to church I'm forced to come. But instead of praying I'm thinking about atheist songs!
In september I will begin the last year of high school and I'm planning to study at Vienna after that. If I have luck and integrate there I'm planning to become a Buddhist.
Why? because Buddhism is sincere that is man made and is more believable than Christianity. Buddhism is about finding happiness in life and finding balance. Yes, they may have some wrong claims but they don't force you to believe them.
So, this was my story. What do you think? Did you also grow in a religious house (christian, jewish, muslim, etc.). Please tell me.

[Mister Agenda]

Welcome, Die Atheistin, I hope you like our forum.

I was raised a Pentecostal Christian, a fundamentalist evangelical sect.

I was born in Champagne, IL. A woman named Vashti McCollum who also lived there got religious education in American public schools overturned in 1948. (McCollum vs. Board of Education of School District 71).

[brewer]

Woof Woof Welcome young one!

I left at about the same age as you.

Sorry that they still drag you into the religion realm (pray, church, ......) It may not be intentional.

When my parents continued to drag to church I'd sit with them until it started and tell them I had to pee. Got up and left and did not return to the service. They gave up on me and church after about three times. They didn't want me actually peeing or creating a scene in front of the other worshipers. Give that a try. If you can't make it home from church just sit outside (some place secluded) and read, hang out, do what ever. 

Tell us some non-religious stuff about you when you get the time.

[The Industrial Atheist]

Hi, die Atheism. My family wasn't overtly religious, but I was forced to go to a Catholic School due to bullying (where I was bullied even worse.) Also I was forced to go to different Church services. Stepdad no.2 was Pentecostal so I went to a Pentecostal Church in my teens. For awhile I went to a nondenominational church and before that the same Pentecostal Church of my own free will. But my mom never held much to specific beliefs and my extended family is very non religious. I was told that the family of my father (who left the state to avoid child support, under the direction of my grandparents) were kind of holier-than-thou Christians. Maybe it's best I never had direct contact with them although we all live in the same town and I'm sure we've seen each other.
Anyway a little over a year ago I stopped believing.
Mainly it was the futility in trying to follow rules that can't be followed. That and an audio copy of "The God Delusion" from the local online library.

Sent from my LGL52VL using Tapatalk

[Der/die AtheistIn]

Woof Woof Welcome young one!

I left at about the same age as you.

Sorry that they still drag you into the religion realm (pray, church, ......) It may not be intentional.

When my parents continued to drag to church I'd sit with them until it started and tell them I had to pee. Got up and left and did not return to the service. They gave up on me and church after about three times. They didn't want me actually peeing or creating a scene in front of the other worshipers. Give that a try. If you can't make it home from church just sit outside (some place secluded) and read, hang out, do what ever. 

Tell us some non-religious stuff about you when you get the time.

Thank you very much. I would like to try your method, but our churches don't usually have bathrooms near by, and my father woul'd be very angry if I tried to get away from church. But I will soon be on my own feet and then I will do whathever I wan't to. Your comment really made me happy!

[brewer]

Thank you very much. I would like to try your method, but our churches don't usually have bathrooms near by, and my father woul'd be very angry if I tried to get away from church. But I will soon be on my own feet and then I will do whathever I wan't to. Your comment really made me happy!

What? Churches without bathrooms??? That's just wrong, and not very christian. You should renounce your faith based on that alone. hehehe

[Astonished]

Hello, I'm a girl from Romania (a country from East Europe), which is a pretty religious country. Most people are orthodhox christians, I used to be myself.
In Romania religion is OBLIGATORY teached in schools. Ok, not obligatory... if you get grades from other place. At the very least I think so, sorry if I'm misleading, this country's system is bullshit, it's hard for me to get it.
Anyway, so I started learning religion in first grade (Religion is taught from first to twelfth grade). My teacher taught us about the Bible, about how god created Adam and Eve, about how God loves us so much that he can send us to Hell etc.
I, as a stupid kid believed all of that. Then in middle school (just so you know, in Romania it starts at fifth grade) I had a different teacher. She, like the other one, thaught pretty much the same things. 
One day (in the seventh grade) I was alone with a friend from my father. I told him something we learned at religion class, and he told me that I shouldn't believe that. He was a christian, he just didn't believe in the Old Testament or in hell. 
I was really mad, I tought that my family and friends were brainwashed too (I still think that, but to a lesser level). The fact that an oncle of mine is a priest didn't help. In the eight grade I told my parents that I don't want to go to church anymore and that I want only to pray at home. They didn't understand me so I started to scream. In the end they convinced me that they don't believe in hell, nor do they think that atheists are bad. They only go to church because of positive energy. I calmed myself down and I countinued to belive in Jesus.
But something still felt, I was somethings thinking uncontrollable swear words about the Bible, Jesus and saints. I told this my mother one day and she replied to me that thoughts like that can appear and that I need to think at something else.
I discovered DarkMatter2525 on YouTube and really liked his videos (still a fan by the way!), and with time I become an agnostic theist.
In the eight grade our teacher showed us the movie God's not Dead and I kind of liked it. Years later I looked at the reviews and wondered why it was so hated by critics. I saw a review of this movie on YouTube and than it hit me. I didn't get why it was so bad at first, because I was still brainwashed! That was the last drop!
I was so tented to become an atheist so i looked on arguments for atheism and liked how logical they were. I watched videos from Tj Kirk and Cult of Dusty and some other atheist youtubers. I even started to listen to atheist music.
I didn't tell my family that I'm atheist, I only told my mother that I'm agnostic and she accepted it. She said that I'm free to think what I want!
Though she still encourages me to pray and when my family goes to church I'm forced to come. But instead of praying I'm thinking about atheist songs!
In september I will begin the last year of high school and I'm planning to study at Vienna after that. If I have luck and integrate there I'm planning to become a Buddhist.
Why? because Buddhism is sincere that is man made and is more believable than Christianity. Buddhism is about finding happiness in life and finding balance. Yes, they may have some wrong claims but they don't force you to believe them.
So, this was my story. What do you think? Did you also grow in a religious house (christian, jewish, muslim, etc.). Please tell me.

Good for you (although I can't see how you could have liked GND even if you were brainwashed at the time...LOL.) Not sure why you would want to label yourself Buddhist if you're just going to cherry-pick the same kind of things that Xtians do, seems illogical so perhaps think about it first?

I was in a fairweather nondenominational Xtian household growing up. Only child of a single mother, who was stigmatized by the neighborhood for being a Hester Prynne in their midst. Grandma spoke in tongues at church and scared the shit out of me on the rare occasions we ever did attend (mom made excuses like grandma's health was making it too difficult to get her out of the house but I knew better). Since the only thing that could have made her sin of an out-of-wedlock child worse was the result that I might happen to be gay when I started developing sexually, homophobia was instilled (didn't take much to break out of that, and it wasn't even based on sex or what the bible said for that matter). But the straw that broke the camel's back was my uncle, a pretty warped zealot but not exactly a fundamentalist; yes, everything about everything revolved around Jesus but he didn't take the bible literally (fortunately; I may have seen he was full of shit but he was a big, strong dude even when I got to be an adult and was catching up to him.) But one thing he said to me, I was still very young, and had something of a Christopher Hitchens moment where one of his religious instructors misspoke and dispelled the entire illusion. He told me that we were all 'evil'. Well, that did it. No loving god would have such a lowly opinion of his creation, especially not its innocent little children. This was an unbreakable paradox and the fact that no one had even attempted to answer how dinosaurs didn't conflict with creation and other such inconsistencies made going back impossible. The family degenerated after that; grandma got dementia for a few years and died, mom had a massive stroke and I ended up in the foster care system. I don't regret it; they got progressively worse as I got older and I never told them I was an atheist the entire time. I did call my uncle one last time a few years after I turned 18 and told him, just to stick it in his face for being such a huge dick about it. You can imagine his response; "Oh, you'll come around to the truth one day, I just know it." Classy, Uncle D-bag.

[SteelCurtain]

Welcome Die Atheistin!

I am from a pretty religious (but in the weird shallow hypocritical way that seems to be endemic to America) household, but I never really believed it. I didn't know what an atheist even was until I was like 16. I wouldn't take the mantle until I moved out of my parents house.

Great to see you on the website! Hope you stick around!

[Chad32]

I have a religious grandmother, and lived right across the street from a church during my childhood, so you bet I was raised christian. They were a friendly, liberal bunch, though. More loving thy neighbor than fire and brimstone. It wasn't too bad, but I eventually grew out of it, the more I really thought about things, and talked to people over the internet.

I was a baptist in Alabama, though I went to a methodist church sometimes too.

[Der/die AtheistIn]

Hello, I'm a girl from Romania (a country from East Europe), which is a pretty religious country. Most people are orthodhox christians, I used to be myself.
In Romania religion is OBLIGATORY teached in schools. Ok, not obligatory... if you get grades from other place. At the very least I think so, sorry if I'm misleading, this country's system is bullshit, it's hard for me to get it.
Anyway, so I started learning religion in first grade (Religion is taught from first to twelfth grade). My teacher taught us about the Bible, about how god created Adam and Eve, about how God loves us so much that he can send us to Hell etc.
I, as a stupid kid believed all of that. Then in middle school (just so you know, in Romania it starts at fifth grade) I had a different teacher. She, like the other one, thaught pretty much the same things. 
One day (in the seventh grade) I was alone with a friend from my father. I told him something we learned at religion class, and he told me that I shouldn't believe that. He was a christian, he just didn't believe in the Old Testament or in hell. 
I was really mad, I tought that my family and friends were brainwashed too (I still think that, but to a lesser level). The fact that an oncle of mine is a priest didn't help. In the eight grade I told my parents that I don't want to go to church anymore and that I want only to pray at home. They didn't understand me so I started to scream. In the end they convinced me that they don't believe in hell, nor do they think that atheists are bad. They only go to church because of positive energy. I calmed myself down and I countinued to belive in Jesus.
But something still felt, I was somethings thinking uncontrollable swear words about the Bible, Jesus and saints. I told this my mother one day and she replied to me that thoughts like that can appear and that I need to think at something else.
I discovered DarkMatter2525 on YouTube and really liked his videos (still a fan by the way!), and with time I become an agnostic theist.
In the eight grade our teacher showed us the movie God's not Dead and I kind of liked it. Years later I looked at the reviews and wondered why it was so hated by critics. I saw a review of this movie on YouTube and than it hit me. I didn't get why it was so bad at first, because I was still brainwashed! That was the last drop!
I was so tented to become an atheist so i looked on arguments for atheism and liked how logical they were. I watched videos from Tj Kirk and Cult of Dusty and some other atheist youtubers. I even started to listen to atheist music.
I didn't tell my family that I'm atheist, I only told my mother that I'm agnostic and she accepted it. She said that I'm free to think what I want!
Though she still encourages me to pray and when my family goes to church I'm forced to come. But instead of praying I'm thinking about atheist songs!
In september I will begin the last year of high school and I'm planning to study at Vienna after that. If I have luck and integrate there I'm planning to become a Buddhist.
Why? because Buddhism is sincere that is man made and is more believable than Christianity. Buddhism is about finding happiness in life and finding balance. Yes, they may have some wrong claims but they don't force you to believe them.
So, this was my story. What do you think? Did you also grow in a religious house (christian, jewish, muslim, etc.). Please tell me.

Good for you (although I can't see how you could have liked GND even if you were brainwashed at the time...LOL.) Not sure why you would want to label yourself Buddhist if you're just going to cherry-pick the same kind of things that Xtians do, seems illogical so perhaps think about it first?

I was in a fairweather nondenominational Xtian household growing up. Only child of a single mother, who was stigmatized by the neighborhood for being a Hester Prynne in their midst. Grandma spoke in tongues at church and scared the shit out of me on the rare occasions we ever did attend (mom made excuses like grandma's health was making it too difficult to get her out of the house but I knew better). Since the only thing that could have made her sin of an out-of-wedlock child worse was the result that I might happen to be gay when I started developing sexually, homophobia was instilled (didn't take much to break out of that, and it wasn't even based on sex or what the bible said for that matter). But the straw that broke the camel's back was my uncle, a pretty warped zealot but not exactly a fundamentalist; yes, everything about everything revolved around Jesus but he didn't take the bible literally (fortunately; I may have seen he was full of shit but he was a big, strong dude even when I got to be an adult and was catching up to him.) But one thing he said to me, I was still very young, and had something of a Christopher Hitchens moment where one of his religious instructors misspoke and dispelled the entire illusion. He told me that we were all 'evil'. Well, that did it. No loving god would have such a lowly opinion of his creation, especially not its innocent little children. This was an unbreakable paradox and the fact that no one had even attempted to answer how dinosaurs didn't conflict with creation and other such inconsistencies made going back impossible. The family degenerated after that; grandma got dementia for a few years and died, mom had a massive stroke and I ended up in the foster care system. I don't regret it; they got progressively worse as I got older and I never told them I was an atheist the entire time. I did call my uncle one last time a few years after I turned 18 and told him, just to stick it in his face for being such a huge dick about it. You can imagine his response; "Oh, you'll come around to the truth one day, I just know it." Classy, Uncle D-bag.

The thing is I'm more scared that my family would judge me if I didn't have a religion at all rather than changing my religion. And I find Buddhism better than other religions, I'm not planning to follow every single rule of it.
And about GND, not only was I brainwashed but I also didn't understand that the acting was bad. And I'l give the movie a little credit, The proffesor became an atheist and a bad guy because he has lost his mother even though he praied. Yes, people can become atheists without suffering but at the very least they didn't make him entirely bad. And the fact that a God would allow such bad things to happen is a good argument for atheism, I do think that he had a good reason to become an atheist. How I said, he had a good reason to become an atheist, so he shouldn't have been put in the wrong.

---

I have a religious grandmother, and lived right across the street from a church during my childhood, so you bet I was raised christian. They were a friendly, liberal bunch, though. More loving thy neighbor than fire and brimstone. It wasn't too bad, but I eventually grew out of it, the more I really thought about things, and talked to people over the internet.

I was a baptist in Alabama, though I went to a methodist church sometimes too.

Yeah, I also had a nanny who was religious, she used to take me to church sometimes and teach me about christianity. She was a good woman.
My parents only go to church because they say the idea of a loving God makes you happy and because they are around other people so they get positive energy from them.
But think it's the same like saying "The reallity is scary so we imagine it as we like".
What bothers me is that they didn't tell me that untill I asked them and they trusted religion in school. At their time Romania was communist and religion wasn't taught in schools. My mom told me that because of that they didn't expect it to have negative effects on me.
My parents aren't stupid in general, but they trust religion too much. Considering where they came from, I can understand it.