A little background on my religious history: I was raised in a fundamentalist Christian household, and went to church every Sunday (average 2-3x a week) until I left for college. Picture "Jesus Camp", maybe a half a step to a step down. I participated in youth group, Christian summer camps and rallies, and sang in the church choir. I was taught from as far back as I can remember that the Bible is the literal word of God, that man is born in a sinful state, and that all those who do not accept Jesus Christ as their personal savior are condemned to an eternity in hell.

I, of course, believed every word of this. Why wouldn't I? My mom and dad believed it, everyone at my church believed it, all of my church and camp friends believed it. I can remember being worried about what happened to babies (they're too young to accept Christ, does that mean they go to hell?) and stuff like that, but otherwise didn't give any of this any serious thought. Even in my teenaged years, when I was less than thrilled with going to church because I'd rather sleep in, and I didn't really apply an rigorous thought to what I had been taught. It's just what I believed - or rather accepted - as the gospel truth.

Then I went to college and started questioning some other things. Then the Army. Then more college, and with each step more exposure to new ideas, as well as a greater capacity to think logically. With each step, there was more and more to question about what I had been taught as a child. If God is all-knowing and all-loving, then why would he create mankind with free will and punish us for it? Surely he knew what would happen - why create us knowing we would screw up, then punish the entire human race for the sin of two people? Why would a loving God condemn anyone to a literal eternity of torment for a mere lifetime of mistakes - even a truly evil person would be evil for what, 70 years? 80? 90? And for that, an eternity of torture? Why would a loving God do that?

So now I don't know what I believe. I struggle with the concept of what happens after death (does ANYTHING happen, or do we just cease to exist?), and with how we all got here in the first place. I struggle to understand if there is a God, and if so, what his actual plan is - there are so many religions, and prophets, and so much interpretation and misapplication of anything any prophet was actually told that surely any religion today must be a mere warped distortion of the original intent.

I don't expect anyone here to have "the answer", but if anyone has any thoughts or ideas or similar experiences, I'd like to hear them.

Many atheists went through the same thing, me included. Keep questioning stuff, expose yourself to both sides of the debate, look for evidence, question your beliefs , etc.. You'll be fine.

Youtube is a great place to hear similar stories... check these guys below

http://www.youtube.com/user/Evid3nc3 <--(someone who made a series about the whole deconversion , really well done , you might enjoy it)
http://www.youtube.com/user/XandarsMeteor <--( also someone who made a series about the deconversion)

I would guess that a lot of people who are now atheists struggled through the same things that you are facing now. Personally I grew up in a family that went to church every Sunday, I was baptized, got communion and was confirmed. That said, it doesn't sound like I grew up in a household that was as intensely religious as yours was so the transition was likely easier.

There is still room for you to believe in God while answering the questions that you have(there are many bright minds who have been able to do this) But every time I tried to do that myself it felt very dishonest, like I was justifying beliefs I sort of knew in the back of my mind were wrong. (knew might be the wrong word, we can't really know)

This has been the toughest part IMO. Whenever someone talks about a friend or family member who has died and comforts themselves in the fact that they will be reunited in the next life, I start to hate that I don't think that is how it's going to go down. I hope I am wrong about heaven but you can only believe what you believe.

Obviously this is still a decision that you have to make and one that you have to make alone. Hopefully you can figure out your own answer soon and you can move on from this stage of being "in limbo".

Like the previous two posters, I am an atheist raised as a catholic and I went through exactly the same thing you are experiencing now when I was about 16. I started questioning everything that the church taught me, and I held onto religion for a few years by not thinking about it when I knew deep down I no longer believed any of it.

You have to explore these topics each for yourself and try to come up with your own answers. Nothing is black and white, and my answer to many of those questions is I don't know. I don't know where we all came from, why we're here, or what will happen after we die. I do know I'm not comfortable basing my beliefs on faith. I'm not okay believing things just because the church told me to, or because the bible tells me to, or because some other religion or holy book told me to. I'm not even willing to think Christianity is right when I only believe it by chance, and others believe other religions because they were born into them. As of now I just look at evidence and see what I think is likely to be true and go from there.

Thank you for your post. It wasn't easy transitioning from a moderately religious household to an atheist, I can not imagine how much harder it must have been for you.

I would just say that being abe to embrace this life, to find my own meaning, my own morality, to think critically about life without the dogma of religion has been own of my most profound and empowering experiences. Do not worry about the uncertainty you feel, it is natural, but know that this path that you are on can and I am confident will bring you the kind of joy and fulfillment that religion usually claims a monopoly over

Thank you for your replies so far.

I wouldn't define myself as an atheist, or at least not at this time. I'm not sure what I would call myself. An extremely lapsed Protestant? A seeker? Someone with a lot of questions and no idea what to think or believe?

The idea of actually saying, even to myself, that I don't believe in God is pretty foreign to me. There's never been a time I can recollect that I ever thought to myself, "There is no God."

I'd say at the very least that I have serious doubts about organized religion as I understand it. There are so many contradictions that I can't reconcile all of the beliefs of my youth without also surrendering a lot of other things.

This is something that has been creeping up on me. My boyfriend and I have been discussing marriage and kids, which I think brings this to a head for me. There's no way I would ever raise them the way I was raised (although I don't blame my parents, who were themselves loving and very good parents - they were simply carrying on how they themselves had been raised), but then what do I do?

I recognize I'm not asking anything particularly earth shattering here - humans have been thinking about these things since the beginning of man. It's just a struggle, though, since I had all the answers at one point (even if those answers were wrong), which is a lot more reassuring than, "I don't know."

You are not alone. My background is very similar to yours. I consider myself to be an Agnostic Deist now.

Good post. Good explanation.

It really is a huge leap to go from being an active, practicing Christian to calling yourself an atheist. That is too much to ask for, unless you are very independent.

Be content to view yourself as a skeptic.

We cannot promise you eternal life.

What is the alternative?

A perfectly righteous and just God creates man.
Man disobeys God.
God pats man on the head, smiles, and says: oh you rascal.

That is not a God who loves justice.

Disobedience carries a price.

Remember that God is raising children
We pray to the "Father."
If your child disobeys you, he must disciplined.
If you spare the rod, eventually, you will have a wild donkey on your hands.

Furthermore, the story of the garden is not about nominal disobedience.
This was no small sin.
This was no oopsie.
God made it very clear that the penalty would be severe.
Man, therefore, chose to change his very makeup.
His very perspective was transformed.
He now knew evil only in a way God's enemy, the adversary, knew it.
He changed who HE WAS.

Imagine you raise your son, love him, feed him, give him everything, and one day, he decides to change his last name.
Not just that.
But do it on the urging of your sworn enemy.
He chooses not to see things the way you do anymore.
He chooses not to represent the family anymore.


You'd rather not exist, than serve God?

For all have sinned, and fallen short of the Glory of God.

And yeah, I could go on and on here, but I believe 100%, as a former backslider myself, that nobody rejects God on the basis of these kinds of arguments, anyway.
Usually it's a girlfriend or boyfriend arriving on the scene, and we want to have sex, or we start to be lured in by the party-lifestyle of friends and peers, and we start the self-justification, the "well, it's probably all bologna anyway because of this and that and this."
So I won't really bother.
I'll just pray for ya, pal.

Anyone who has taken a few hours of Psychology 101 knows that people ignore "Wet Paint" signs to check for themselves if it really is wet.



Wouldn't God be that smart?

"You may eat from all the trees except this one. Here, let me point it out to you. Right here."

Oops! You ate it? Who knew that would happen? Now you and all your descendants are forked.

Well for starters the idea that God is all-loving is contradicted by the actual Bible, so don't let that bother you. Secondly, God did not punish Adam and Eve for having free will. He punished them for freely choosing to act against him. In fact without free will punishment makes no sense, as in criminal justice. Once they lost their immortality and so forth, they no longer possessed those qualities to pass them to their descendants.

There is no reason to think God would. This "eternity of torment after death" concept is not found in scripture. We've gone over this before.

Fortunately these question don't require answers, because they're non-issues, Biblically speaking.

Nice 666th post Dogg...

God created us all to be his obedient lap dogs.

Watch out or He will rub your nose in it.

SGTRJ, I think that once you have opened your eyes to the possibility that there is no god, you will start to see all of the silly arguments and rationalizations for what they are. That's what happened to me at least.

No worries you get use to not knowing.

If this helps: there is no evidence that either something happens after death or that there is any being that fits the definition of a "god". Hence, there is no reason to believe in those things in the first place. In fact there are reasons to NOT believe in them.

The "believers" in the thread already had all the answers.
And just in case you don't find them convincing, eternal torture in Evil
Fantasy Land might help you see the light and realize that Jesus loves you.

I don't have The Answer, no. But then again, unlike them, I was never dead and do not come back to Earth to convince you of how the best thing about your life right now, is that you're going to die.

But looking at all the religions and what they say, it's no wonder seeing cowards mentally (not only) raping little kids, manipulating them, threatening them with death and pain, because they feel they need to start the manipulation early on for you to believe it and are too spineless to admit their ignorance...............they don't have the answer.
And they are too scared to ask it themselves. That's why they cover their ears and shout out their Death Cult drivel.

It's pretty simple. Everyone who claims to have a direct answer, but when being asked, says, "the only guy who can tell you is invisible", doesn't have an answer.

I am about to sound like an atheist which I am not yet, but I am in the process of becoming one. I still believe in God somewhat but I live my life by classifying things into Good and Bad. I was also a firm believer until I came to know about things I was not told by my elders.I don't think my life or my after-life(which doesn't exist imo) has anything to do with God.

You are right, a loving God would never do that. A loving God is concerned about the well being of human beings, but unfortunately the Human race is suffering.

We live a very good life, what about the people in third world countries? Do they not believe in him?Why do people die of horrible diseases? What wrong did they do? Why does a new born minutes after birth? Any answers?

Are people with faith happier than the atheists? No, they are not. We have that illusion because there are more in number than the atheists.

Nothing happens after death, the whole idea that after-life is decided by how you conduct yourself in your lifetime is BS. It is made up by people who didn't know that Earth revolves round the Sun and believed otherwise.
How intelligent they were? Not much imo. If they were not so insightful, should you believe the BS they said? NO.


Is there God? What did he do to make us believe that he is there? Nothing.
There is a very strong chance that there is no higher power. Generation after generation we believed what our elders had to say. Did any of us ever see god? No, no one ever did. We cannot use Bible as a proof for anything. It was written many thousand years ago. How can we believe people who wrote bible were more intelligent than us? Why not believe what we see.... The truth is that earth is a large petri dish, with optimum conditions for life. No higher power gave this life to us, and none can take it. We should be good humans not for God but for our fellow beings.

'If you see a blind man, kick him; why should you be kinder than God.' - Iranian Proverb.

Your questions of evil in the world have been tackled by theologians, not that anyone has any definitive answers. Having been raised catholic (I don't practice and have many doubts myself), I can tell you St. Augustine wrote about this extensively.

I really feel sorry for any children you have/ will have in the future.

"If your child disobeys you, he must disciplined."
Really? In every single instance of disobedience? why? You need slavish obedience from your children?

"Imagine you raise your son, love him, feed him, give him everything, and one day, he decides to change his last name.
Not just that.
But do it on the urging of your sworn enemy.
He chooses not to see things the way you do anymore.
He chooses not to represent the family anymore."

If this happened I would be very upset, would I persecute and torture my son for the rest of eternity for it? I hope not.

Your condescension is appalling, as usual. These are precisely the reasons most people lose faith. But keep your head in the sand. I suppose it makes it easier for you to call everyone else petulant children rather than accept that people don't agree with you.

You are very immature.

Heaven for everyone from the first day they are born... SOMEHOW heaven is all perfect, has free will and no evil , yet GOD simply could not just allow everyone into it from their first day of life. This is the problem of Christianity.

@Doggg - You do realize that I've heard those arguments, or said that same thing to myself dozens if not hundreds of times, right?

That doesn't change the basic fact that, if you believe the Bible is the literal and inviolate word of God, you essentially believe that the human race (at least those who fail to accept Jesus Christ as their personal savior) is going to end up in eternal torment because 6000 years ago, the first man and woman ate a piece of fruit.



So I think I'm comfortable with saying at this point that I do not believe that the Bible is the literal word of God. There are obviously many parables and stories designed to teach specific truths (obey God or be punished, for example).

Which parts, if any, are more than parables, I'm not sure.

That said, if you are going to post patronizing statements, such as the contention that people in general and I specifically am questioning my previous beliefs because I wanted to have sex, then please just stop.

It sounds as if a lot of other people have been through this questioning process, which doesn't surprise me, and I thank you for your words of encouragement/support. Although part of me is distressed at the idea that the only end game would be deciding that there is no God. I'm not sure I'm near that point, or at least not yet.

SGT RJ if you get a chance watch TheraminTrees "there are no gods" he talks about the similar thoughts you are having that are causing you to question your religion.

part 1
http://youtu.be/YkExxkrMyU4
part 2
http://youtu.be/Pt9x3CnxApo

It's funny, when I saw the title of this thread I though it was an old one of mine brought back from the archives... I started a thread with the exact same title a few years ago, and I wrote a very similar post to yours (I was raised a strict Catholic and was just starting to question everything I'd been taught).

I still remember someone wrote the following reply to me at the time: "The flowering of the rational mind is a beautiful thing. Congratulations."

That reply sticks with me because in hindsight that's what happened. My rational mind finally overcame the brainwashing. And now a few years later, I couldn't be happier about it.

And yes, maybe brainwashing is a strong word... but I think it fits. Your post illustrates this. You believed it all because it was taught to you as a child. In most cases that is how people end up believing, regardless of religion. But of course, as a child you don't really have the capacity for rational thought or judgement - you just believe what the authority figures in your life tell you. It's natural.

But you are one of the lucky ones whose rational mind is powerful enough to escape the years of programming you underwent as a child. You should be glad of this, although I know the thought of not believing in God is scary at first. But I don't think there is any turning back for you now. I think you know it is all false, but are still at the stage where admitting it with finality is scary. I've been there.

When you realize that this world is what matters, and that there is no invisible man watching everything you do, it will lighten the load I guarantee it. When you realize you won't see your loved ones in heaven, you will value the time you have with them more, and make more of a point to enjoy their company and every moment of your life. It really is a very liberating feeling to be rid of the chains.

+1, similar experience here... Although I started questioning religion progressively with the knowledge I was gaining from school since the age of 8 or so. Science classes , especially biology started me to question the idea of Adam and Eve. My transformation was following..

Catholic ->
(8 to 12)Believer in GOD and JESUS but rejection of Catholic church as institution (thinking church leaders and priests lie a bit) ->
(12-16)Deist (that's when I started to realize how my place and time of birth have affected me to believe in Christian God rather then any other GOD) ->
(16-27)nonbeliever (but still not calling myself an atheists due to internal fears from the child indoctrination, fearing hell etc, ->
(27-now)atheist (no longer afraid to say it.)

*age is close approximation

I too was raised in catholic household and really started to question it when i went to catholic high school. One of the biggest things for me was how religion was very much based on your geography. From there i branched out and after a few years of "soul searching" i can accurately and opening define my position as an athiest. The problem with that work is many are afraid to say it in society because it has very negative implications. You will often see people use agnostic as if it is a lesser of the two and more "accepted by society." (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fkEJtQJ5tz4)
If you have yet to see religulous by bill maher id highly suggest watching that. The entire movie can be seen on youtube mirrored for free. Theres great clips on youtube with Christopher Hitchens debating people such as Tony Blair and many other religious figures. There are also plenty of open forums with many other bright minds from Neil Degrasse Tyson, daniel dennett, etc.

I think as many pointed out youtube is a great starting place. I have just started to branch out beyond that and am currently reading "The God delusion" by Richard Dawkins. Id recommend that or Christopher Hitchens book "God is not Good"

There are some fantastic people on youtube that are very good at educating what science says and what the bible says. Some of the better youtube channels that deal with religion and science are:
aronRa
brettpalmer
C0nc0rdance *
cdk007
darkantics
dankmatter2525
dprjones
evid3nc3
nonstampcollector *
potholer54 *
potholer54debunks
profmth
qualiasoup
thelivingdinosaur *
TheraminTrees
theoreticalbul***** its spelled out so fix the ending
thunderf00t *

I put a * the ones i feel have the most useful videos in them. I have compiled a playlist for my gf actually who is at the same point. The playlist has really helped her open her mind. She grew up in a very religious family and is now opening her eyes to new possibilities. Science will never have all the answers but it will give you the best answer we have at the moment. Science is every changing where as fundamental religions maintain the same teachings.

Some great science shows are "through the wormhole" with morgan freedman, "curiosity," and "wonders of our universe."

If i can be any more help let me know