Question for those not raised in religious homes

[vulcanlogician]

I didn't think about religion a lot when I was a kid.  I know people in fundamentalist homes do, but for the rest, in the average home, I don't think people give it that much thought.  Maybe that just reflects my experience.  There were the late night talks about God, but not a lot of actually really spending a lot of time alone thinking about it.

Meh, it can be an issue. I was raised in a Catholic home, and my sister was/is deeply religious. She was not a nutcase or anything. Just a devoted Catholic girl who said her Hail Marys and accepted the Catholic doctrine in its entirety. When I was a teenager, she picked up on the fact I didn't believe. There was drama involved--and not due to my expressing my lack of belief in the slightest. At the time, I went to Mass with my family, took communion, and more or less kept my atheism to myself. I was sort of a closet atheist. 

I remember one year she got me The Student Bible as a birthday present. It was a blatant attempt to proselytize. Actually, it was a pretty nice gift. It was heavily annotated and gave tons of background information and context for specific verses/passages. And it really helped seal the deal for me being an atheist. 

For one thing it had something resembling this image in Genesis:

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It also pointed out the contradiction with the number of Noah's animals. I remember reading things like "not having contact with a women during the uncleanliness of her period" and thinking, "this is some backwards ass shit."

[I_am_not_mafia]

I wasn't brought up in a religious home, although the first two schools I was sent to were religious and taught creationism.

I actually asked my mother a few years ago why she thought me being taught creationism meant that I was getting a good education (both were private schools, so my parents took my education seriously). She replied that she didn't know that I was being taught that.

Anyway, even though the home wasn't religious, it was woo-ish, with beliefs in reincarnation, ghosts, seances etc. I think that held me back from developing my critical thinking skills until I started studying for my science based MSc.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

[derail] During Operation Market-Garden a bunch of US GIs were rowing rubber boats across a river under fire. Mortar, machine guns, rifle fire, they had their choice. As they were rowing one guy kept repeating "Hail Mary, full of grace" over and over again. When they made the far bank one of the other guys asked him why he didn't finish the prayer. He blushed and said "That's all I could remember."

"Well, padre, I hope you do better than that in the future!"

(Taken from official US Army histories.) [/derail]

[robvalue]

A disadvantage of being raised in a non-religious home is that I have no idea where believers are coming from. It's simply irrational to me to believe in an imaginary friend when you're an adult.

I agree with this. Until I spent a lot of time looking into the psychology of religion and the kind of practices that go on, I couldn't understand it. I thought it was just a load of crazy people.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

A disadvantage of being raised in a non-religious home is that I have no idea where believers are coming from. It's simply irrational to me to believe in an imaginary friend when you're an adult.

I agree with this. Until I spent a lot of time looking into the psychology of religion and the kind of practices that go on, I couldn't understand it. I thought it was just a load of crazy people.

I still do. I consider the vast majority of "religious" people to be faking it because that's what is required of them by their society. Hopefully there will be some tipping point where being non-religious is finally acceptable.

[johan]

I grew up in a non-religious home. My parents and siblings weren't atheist though, just lazy. I remember my mother briefing me once when her sister was visiting from the midwest. She said that if Aunt Jackie asks you about going to church, tell her we went early this morning. Today there's not a lot of communication between my siblings and myself but as far as I know, I'm the only one that identifies as atheist. One brother is a 12-stepper and he and his wife pray at meals although I don't believe they attend church regularly. The other brothers as far as I know fall into the category not following any particular religion but having a loosely held belief that some sort of god exists.

As for critical thinking and the like, neither religion nor atheism were ever discussed in our house and I don't recall any kind of thinking, critical or otherwise, ever being encouraged. Its probably a miracle that I'm even able to form complete sentences when my upbringing is considered.

[robvalue]

I agree with this. Until I spent a lot of time looking into the psychology of religion and the kind of practices that go on, I couldn't understand it. I thought it was just a load of crazy people.

I still do. I consider the vast majority of "religious" people to be faking it because that's what is required of them by their society. Hopefully there will be some tipping point where being non-religious is finally acceptable.

Sure, there are probably many people faking it, either for fear of not fitting in, or for the very real consequences they may face if they are found out. And I think that even among genuine believers, there is an element of exaggeration among some of them regarding exactly how far their beliefs go.

I don't think people realize how much their actions, and even their words, betray their own professed beliefs; the human brain is very good at this kind of compartmentalising. There is also the fear of change, and of having to reconsider everything from the ground up, if they allow their beliefs to be properly dug up and analysed. This isn't just a religious phenomenon either.

[Gawdzilla Sama]

I still do. I consider the vast majority of "religious" people to be faking it because that's what is required of them by their society. Hopefully there will be some tipping point where being non-religious is finally acceptable.

Sure, there are probably many people faking it, either for fear of not fitting in, or for the very real consequences they may face if they are found out. And I think that even among genuine believers, there is an element of exaggeration among some of them regarding exactly how far their beliefs go.

I don't think people realize how much their actions, and even their words, betray their own professed beliefs; the human brain is very good at this kind of compartmentalising. There is also the fear of change, and of having to reconsider everything from the ground up, if they allow their beliefs to be properly dug up and analysed. This isn't just a religious phenomenon either.

Yeah, like being a Cubs fan in Chicago.

[brewer]

I have been curious about this for a while. For those of you who were not raised in a religious family, did you think that gave you an advantage not having superstitious beliefs as a child? Did it help you develop critical thinking skills earlier or did you still have some supernatural beliefs?

My parents were religious because their parents were and most of our town was. It was just a thing that you did on Sundays because it was expected in the community. It was more social and political than anything. They needed to look good for the neighbors and business community. My parents didn't squeal all that bad when I jumped off the soul train.

I'm sure that I had some childhood superstitions in my preteen years, but then so did all of the other kids I hung around with. I'm not sure why I broke away from religion when most of the others didn't, but I know that they gave up some childhood superstitions also. Certainly won't claim that I had better critical thinking skills than those that continued to believe. 

Maybe you should identify some of the superstitions you refer to.

[BrianSoddingBoru4]

I have been curious about this for a while. For those of you who were not raised in a religious family, did you think that gave you an advantage not having superstitious beliefs as a child? Did it help you develop critical thinking skills earlier or did you still have some supernatural beliefs?

I'm not sure what being raised in a religious family has to do with being superstitious.  Religion and superstition are very, very different.

Boru