How I Found Atheism

[Vitruvian]

Until I was eight or nine years old, my parents took me and my sister to a Congregational church with them (this and perfunctory prayer before dinner comprised the extent of any explicit indoctrination I received); I remember sitting in the pews, paying absolutely zero attention to the pastor, while I solved puzzles in the little Sunday school booklets.  My family stopped attending for some reason or another around that time. 

I was twelve or thirteen years old before I discovered that I was, in fact, an atheist (a word I learned, appropriately, after perusing a copy of Atheism: The Case Against God).  Had someone thought to ask me whether I was a Christian before that time, I probably wouldn't have known how to answer.  From a very young age, I was completely absorbed in the natural world, in the idea that truth might be found by those who knew where (and especially how) to look.  Thus, without any conscious effort, I was safely inoculated against the influence of religion.

Now, the better part of a decade later, every member of my immediate family self-identifies as an atheist.  I learned only recently that my father has done so for most of his life, but had kept quiet so as not to pressure my sister or me into adopting a certain viewpoint.

[Friday]

OK, don't ask me why this came to mind, but... in my first semester at university, I took Physical Anthropology 101, taught by Prof. Vincent Sarich.  Gotta love a university professor who gets protested.  He had us read The Selfish Gene, by Sir Richard Dawkins.  God damn that Dawkins... he destroyed my lifelong, hardcore faith in Gawd.

I don't know why the hell (pardon the expression  ) I started this thread last night.  Not to put too fine a point on it, but I was trashed.    But since the deed is done, and several people have posted replies, I think I should revise my initial post.  It's a serious subject that deserves a more thoughtful response. Plus, what I wrote really isn't accurate.  So with that in mind...

Russell: brace for wall of text 
everyone who's bored and/or easily offended by the subject: move along

I was raised in a devout Roman Catholic family.  We went to church every Sunday and every holy day, even if we were on vacation, and even if it was a camping vacation.  I was a true believer, and tried very hard to be "good".  I felt I had a close, personal relationship with God, Jesus and Mary.  As I once posted on my blog, my great-aunt the penguin gave me children's books featuring a Roman Catholic saint for every day of the year, and I would read each day's selection before going to bed.  (Since a lot of RC saints were martyred in gruesome ways, this may not have been such a great idea in retrospect; I had a lot of trouble sleeping and had vivid, bloody nightmares.)

I went to Catholic school for grades 1, 2, and high school.  The reason for the gap is because my family relocated frequently and there wasn't always a Catholic school available.  Also, Dad was too cheap to spring for B.C.    I know it's very fashionable to bash the RC Church these days, and I completely agree that there is much to bash, but to be honest, I can't say that I think I was harmed by being sent to Catholic school.  I was never abused by anyone in the church and don't know anyone who was.  I was a very shy, very brainy child, small for my age and a year younger than most of the rest of the class, forced to change schools almost every year, and frankly, I took a lot of comfort in my religion and in the belief that some magical people up in the sky loved me and thought I was special.  I taught myself the Lord's Prayer in Latin.  I even wanted to be a nun for a while.   

When puberty hit, I guess a part of me rejected the religion I had been taught without too much concern.  I really don't remember feeling guilty or evil for having hormones, liking boys and fantasizing about things that were supposed to be "evil".

In junior high, I lived in Saudi Arabia, which was educational in many ways.  I had classmates who were *not* Christian, and you know, they really didn't seem all that bad.  I had neighbors with more than one mommy in the family.  I babysat for a Western family, and a Saudi family, and the babies really didn't seem all that different.  People were people.  At the same time, I observed the ridiculous arbitrariness of some of the religious rules of that country (can't buy pork or alcohol; women can't drive cars or wear shorts when a summer day averages 110 degrees F).  Maybe subconsciously I started wondering if some of the rules of my religion were equally arbitrary; I can't remember.

In high school, I became pretty fed up with Catholicism.  There was so much hypocrisy and do as I say, not as I do.  There was one priest who was pretty cool and the kids liked him; they fired him for being too controversial.  The priest who remained, and the principle who was a nun, both seemed like pretty unhappy people.  The principle quit mid-year, without even saying goodbye.  The priest left the  church a couple of years after I graduated!!  What kind of message did *that* send the kids?  And there was a deacon who stands out in my memory as THE WORST TEACHER I EVER HAD.  He was an ignorant, mean, dishonest, vain person... and they promoted him to full priesthood.  It was widely known amongst the kids that he didn't read our papers; he would just assign a letter grade based on your scholastic reputation in the school.  This didn't harm me any (I was a straight-A dork), but the injustice of it infuriated me.  So on one exam day, I went to town writing two full pages of the most vile, sacrilegious crap I could come up with in a 45-minute period.  I said that the Pope eats babies.  On a question about "the future of the Church", I speculated about the invention of freeze-dried holy water.  And yes, that's right... I got an A on the exam.    He even wrote a comment of "Well done!" next to a particularly long paragraph of anti-Church ranting.  I passed it around the class so everyone could have a well-deserved laugh at Brother Andrew's expense.  I showed it to my mother and she laughed 'til she cried (she hated Brother Andrew too).  I showed it to my Italian granny but I don't think she found it quite as amusing.  Sadly, I lost it at some point; I really wish I still had that thing.

Shortly before starting college, I lost my virginity.  This was, of course, a sin; a big one.  But I could not in good faith go to Confession and say that I was sorry for that particular "sin"... because I WASN'T.  So I never again set foot in a confessional.

So anyway, I left the nest and went off to university at age 17 still believing in God, but fairly convinced that the Church had some severe issues.  I dutifully found the closest Catholic church to campus and started attending.  But as I mentioned in the original post, my very first semester of college, I took a physical anthropology course that really blew my mind.  I loved the professor, loved the subject (I almost majored in it), and could find no flaws in Sir Richard Dawkins' logic in The Selfish Gene, which was only one of several assigned books.  Another enlightening one was "Chimpanzee Politics".  It was disturbing in a way to learn that, despite always having been told that homo samiens is a species unto itself, granted dominion over all others by the Creator, chimpanzees have a very complex social system.  They lie and trick each other.  They form alliances.  They have friends, and enemies.  They stab each other in the back.  They grieve.  And oh yeah, they share 97% of our DNA.     I already had a problem with the whole dominion concept, because I was a huge animal lover my entire life and had as many pets of different kinds as my parents would let me.  And so I had observed, over and over, that every animal is unique, with its own distinct personality, just like every person is unique.  I had several pet rats, which are incredibly smart, sweet, affectionate, and each one is different, and I had a really hard time rationalizing scientific experimentation (I still do).  All that said, I'm not a vegetarian and I wear leather.  I don't feel guilty about having incisors and a brain that craves protein.

So... it was in that first semester of college that I finally decided that I had to make a decision, one way or the other, and I very consciously decided to leave the Catholic church.  I felt terrible about it.  I wasn't 100% sure I was making the right decision, and wondered if I was going to burn in hell one day. 

Despite intellectually believing/knowing there couldn't *really* be a god, it took me several more years where I felt comfortable/honest enough with myself to really say to myself "I am an atheist".  I used the agnostic punk-out in the interim.  And even now, although I guess the label that fits me is "atheist", I think that's an incomplete or misleading term.  I have always been very concerned with "morality"; it's just that my definition of it has changed radically over the years.  I also completely believe that we humans don't know near as much as we *think* we do about the physical universe and the nature of reality.  (I still can't get over the whole "Pluto is no longer a planet. PSYCH!" dealio.  ) And finally, I have ... not sure how to put this... a ?reverence for life? , which might be construed as religion of sorts, or maybe it's natural, I don't know.  It's the practically cliche Jedi Knight/the Force is With You concept.

I have no problem with people who choose to follow Jesus.  I actually have a big problem with people who SAY they follow Jesus, but do things that Jesus would never, ever do.  However, I do think that some of the ideas/quotes attributed to Jesus are pure power plays designed to keep the sheeple in line through emotional manipulation.  (Even when I was devout, the whole "Turn the other cheek" thing made no sense to me.)  See the Zeitgeist thread for endless debate and whining on *that* topic.

So... there you go.  If you've made it this far, thank you for reading.  And to all the Christians, Jews, Muslims, Zoroastrians, and Buddhists among us:

Smash Mouth - Why Can't We Be Friends?

[John Edward Mercier]

The Bible is instruction on how to live? Or the Ten Commandments?

By the way... the Golden Rule is older than Jesus.

What I've heard from any christian church I've attended is that the bible is the instruction book on how to live.  Let's just say even if the 10 commandments were supposed to be the instructions on how to live, look at the contradictions in the bible that go totally against the commandments.  Like "thou shall not kill", why then did god ever tell people to sacrifice lambs for forgiveness of their sins?  I mean it doesn't say, "thou shall not kill people", so then I'm sure killing an animal would violate this commandment, right?

Okay whatever point your trying to get at with the "golden rule" is I guess interesting to somebody that wants to debate on what came from where but I really don't like debating so really  the only comment I have to that response is so what?

It means the Golden Rule isn't founded in Judeo-Christian teachings... most likely just adopted by religious institutions.

[Free libertarian]

 Do you suppose if Jesus were born today, the state would take away God's drivers license if he didn't pay child support?

[Lloyd Danforth]

No.  As usual they would get it wrong and hang the child support on Joseph.

[Lloyd Danforth]

I use to get a kick out of the , anti-industrial Leftest bumper sticker: "What would Jesus drive?" 

He was a Carpenter!  He would drive a Pick-up!  Probably a Big one with dual wheels and a big Honk'in Diesel.

[Lloyd Danforth]

June 21.

http://www.comics.com/comics/monty/

[John Edward Mercier]

I use to get a kick out of the , anti-industrial Leftest bumper sticker: "What would Jesus drive?" 

He was a Carpenter!  He would drive a Pick-up!  Probably a Big one with dual wheels and a big Honk'in Diesel.

With a bumper sticker... 'This is what Jesus drives... get over it.'

[dalebert]

http://www.comics.com/comics/monty/

Superman can fly around the Earth and reverse time and fix stuph.

[Pat K]

I use to get a kick out of the , anti-industrial Leftest bumper sticker: "What would Jesus drive?" 

He was a Carpenter!  He would drive a Pick-up!  Probably a Big one with dual wheels and a big Honk'in Diesel.

[Lloyd Danforth]

I use to get a kick out of the , anti-industrial Leftest bumper sticker: "What would Jesus drive?" 

He was a Carpenter!  He would drive a Pick-up!  Probably a Big one with dual wheels and a big Honk'in Diesel.

With a bumper sticker... 'This is what Jesus drives... get over it.'

[KBCraig]

I use to get a kick out of the , anti-industrial Leftest bumper sticker: "What would Jesus drive?" 

He was a Carpenter!  He would drive a Pick-up!  Probably a Big one with dual wheels and a big Honk'in Diesel.

He was more likely a stonemason than carpenter, so he'd drive extra heavy-duty equipment.

[John Edward Mercier]

I use to get a kick out of the , anti-industrial Leftest bumper sticker: "What would Jesus drive?" 

He was a Carpenter!  He would drive a Pick-up!  Probably a Big one with dual wheels and a big Honk'in Diesel.

Wow... you have some highly paid carpenters in that region.

[FTL_Ian]

Friday, is it possible that we are all "God"?

http://nhunderground.com/forum/index.php?topic=14349.0

[Sam A. Robrin]

[/quote]
the Golden Rule isn't founded in Judeo-Christian teachings... most likely just adopted by religious institutions.

[/quote]

Most religions have some equivalent of it.  What's needed is a corollary that you do unto others as you would have them do unto you provided that those you're doing unto want done what you're doing unto them.  A lot of religious types would want (or would say it was what they would want) to be tortured back to the faith, were they to lose it.  The Golden Rule provides the perfect excuse for those types to get what they really want.