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Question 66

Do you remember when you first realized that you were an atheist?

• No, as it has been a long time coming. My mother tells me we were not taken to church until I was about 5 years old. I recall being surprised that if I was naughty, Jesus would be sad and I might not get to heaven. I had always tried to be a good girl so this was very distressing. I remember wondering why we had to believe in Jesus, but not Santa Claus. But, I was a child and the adults were all so sincere. Of course, our church was THE church. What made it so special could not be explained, however. I remember deciding I wasn't going to Sunday School anymore when I was mid teens as all the teacher could talk about was abstinence. Embarrassing every time, as I was already so guilt ridden, that was farthest from my mind. I believe it would have been anyway as I wasn't ready for adult behaviors or the possibility of pregnancy. Then I left for school 120 miles away. Found out what all the other kids had been up to and I had been missing. I was ready now, however. Was responsible with my health and eventually married the only man I ever had sex with. I had opportunity, but we fit well. After 2 years of fun I was ready for committment, and the guilt had crept back in big time. So we married shortly after out third year anniversary of meeting. I should have spent more time finding myself and supporting myself, but that is past. When I became pregnant three years later, I was desperate to recommit to my 'faith' and began Bible study with a non-demoninational group. Then the Seventh Day Adventist pastor and wife stopped by our home to ask to study. They claimed we would actually be studying the Bible, instead of just a study book with verses looked up here and there. To make an already long story short, in my efforts to understand the Bible I got in with an even more fanatic crowd off the same church for nearly 2 years. Finally, with the more intense study I was able to discover it's all a huge myth. Expensive lesson in more ways than one. I left all religion alone in order to recover. My husband was relieved and divorce was off his schedule. Those 4 years were the dark years of our lives. I then realized what I had been pushing away since preschool. I didn't believe in God. Taught my sons to have compassion and tolerance for those still brainwashed and to be quiet, unless they wanted to be pestered by anyone distressed over their non-belief. ( I am proud of myself for being strong and insisting on having no reference to religious beliefs in our local hospital's mission statement.) Since that time I avoided anything remotely affiliated with theology. But, one day in the Spring I was brave and read an article on Nexus called The Bloodline of the Holy Grail. This helped me to see the Bible as a book of babble. Jesus was probably a rebel atheist.

  Then I became even more bold and found alt. atheism a month or so ago. Discovered people who think like me. Solidified my beliefs since childhood. My husband caught me the other day reading these posts and we found even more common ground.

  I am 43. It seems such a waste to have taken so long to be me, but I guess I have a history of the struggle which may help others come to terms quicker. Believing your instincts earlier can only help a person get on with living life sooner. (Ann -Cat Lady-)

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• Nine years old...very easy then. Conversion experience, mid to late thirties, intense study of the bible and religion in general in order to aquire the knowledge that would allow me to spread the gospel with authority, and a very strong, somewhat angry return to atheism as a result of study. (atheist@home.com #1554)

• I didn't know that I was an atheist, the minister told me.

  I had never heard the word, but I knew that I was going to get the shit beat out of me when my mother found out, and I did. (Puck #162)

• I don't think I ever really took the god concept seriously, unless it was when I still believed in Santa too. I went to a really good school my first few years and they taught some science very early on. Once science took hold, religion was history. I went through most of my adult life never really discussing religion with anyone until I found this group. (Elroy Willis)

• I have never believed in gods, and have always thought that the god concept was ludicrous. When I was about 11 years old, I started referring to myself as a non-believer or an agnostic, since my parents used those phrases to describe themselves. But about 3 years ago (when I was 30), I started researching the subject of atheism on the Internet. That's when I came across infidels.org, alt.atheism and other internet resources, and realized that I fit the definition of atheist generally used in these forums. Since then I have proudly called myself an atheist. (Chris Nelson #135)

• Sometime in 1992. My family and I had been going to church with some friends of ours for about 2 - 3 months,( they were trying to "save" us.) The only thing I could focus on were the untruths about science, and rewriting of history by the minister and the bible study teacher. The one thing that finally made me realize that they were all full of shit was the woman who was upset to the point of hysterics because her brother belonged to the wrong religion. Yet, he too was an xtain. He just didn't belong to her sect. (Roger Andrews #1477)

• More or less. I was sitting in a religious education class in school, aged 14 or 15. A christian brother was standing in for our regular trained) religion teacher, and proposing nonsense of the kind often seen here. He said that faith moves mountains and God answers *every* prayer of True Christians, that the verse "ask and you shall receive" was literally true. With my curiosity aroused, I read the Bible front to back, and by the time I was finished I was certain I was not a Christian.

  Today my atheism is just one facet of a broader skepticism. I don't believe in any gods, ghosts, souls, fairies, leprechauns, grey UFO jockeys from Reticulus, lake monsters, yetis, bigfeet, astrology, prophecy, new age crystals, spoon-benders, psychics, reincarnation, channelling, or a hundred other kinds of nonsense. (Niall McCauley #36) Niall

• I clearly remember when I first put that label to my unbelief. Shortly after my divorce and a move to a new town, I began calling various churches to find one to attend. After listening to two ministers, two lay assistants and a church secretary talk about the wonderful spiritual activities their churches offered, I hung up the phone. I realized that I had been calling the churches only as a quick way to assimilate into my new community. I was looking for instant companionship and support that a church was supposed to offer. I knew there was absolutely no other benefit for church attendance as I had no belief that a god of any description was real. At that moment, I began calling myself an atheist. The necessity of religion had been so ingrained in my psyche by my upbringing that although I had not believed for several years, I still had gone through the motions of religiosity because that's what was expected of me.

  Since that time, I have never found the need to return to church or pray. (Liz Huth #658)

• I realized that I was an atheist when I was 18. I said it out loud to myself, and it was a pretty freeing experience.

  It was the result of a long process, though. As I stated as part of aa question #64, there was an attempt to raise me as a good little Catholic. My mother was from Ireland, went to an all-girl catholic school...the whole bit. My dad was not a Catholic, and had a very live and let live attitude towards religion.

  My father and I would watch all science and science fiction shows, and animal shows such as Wild Kingdom. Asimov was my favorite author while growing-up. I just took it for granted that everyone believed in evolution, old Earth, chimps look an awful lot like us for a reason, etc... It was quite a shock to me when I found that this was not the case.

  When I was 5 and 6, I went to a protestant Sunday school with a cousin on my father's side of the family. It was really fun! We heard stories about floods, and people turning into salt. After story time, we got to eat Saltines tm and drink grape juice. Then we moved. No more Sunday school. I started to go to Catholic church with my parents. The first thing I noticed was that I was no longer allowed to eat the crackers and juice. Only people who went through Communion could do that. I didn't understand why I was suddenly not good enough to eat Saltines tm , but my dad apparently wasn't good enough either, so I accepted it at the time. Then, in the 4th grade, I went through Communion. I was so excited! I was finally going to eat the Catholic version of Saltines tm. Know what? God could use a little salt.

  I don't know what I was expecting, but I realized at that time, that I went through all the motions because it was what I thought I was supposed to do, not because my heart told me to follow that path. After that, I avoided going to church when I could, and refused to go through Confirmation. My mom was hurt by it, but didn't push-it because she still held out hope that I would see the light someday.

  I guess I was a deist at this point. I didn't NOT believe in god, but I did not have any "faith" in any religion. A lot of the trappings of Christianity, such as the devil, angels, virgin births, etc... I had stopped believing long before, but I could not get past that last hurdle. Well, when I was 16, my father died after a 3 year illness. I had time to figure out what I truly believed. When he died and people tried to comfort me by saying that I would see him again someday, I knew that I would not. Believe me, I wanted nothing more than to believe that I would see my father again. I was able to think rationally even at this vulnerable point in my life, so sometimes it is difficult for me to understand (what I perceive to be) irrational belief in others.

  Two years later, while in college, I was exposed to a real library. I discovered The Skeptical Inquirer, and through them, Prometheus Books. Ordering books and intercepting the mail before my mom did was tricky, but I did it. Like HUX aa #1056 states earlier in the thread, "Atheism, The Case Against God" was one of the books that had an influence on me. I still have it in the newspaper cover that I used to disguise it so I could read it at home without my mother having a heart attack. Just seeing these types of books and being able to see "atheism" as a term that applied to myself and some scientists and writers that I admired greatly, and NOT as a term for bad, hateful people, was what I needed to free myself once and for all from religion. If the internet (and this newsgroup) existed when I was in elementary school, I think that I would have been much younger when I finally had the guts to trust my own intelligence. (Paula)

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• To answer this best, from my perspective, and because I am still rather proud of the work, I will repost the article "Why I am an Atheist."

  The reasons aren't really all that complex. The first thing is that, I was a Christian for quite a while. Then, as my pastor requested, I looked deep into my heart, into my love for my fellow man and my morals, and my ethics, and looked to find God at the source for all three of those. What I found was that my love for my fellow man came from my parent's teaching that it is better to make friends than enemies, my morals came from what I thought would be the best policies for certain situations, and my ethics arise from my wish to do what is best for my family, friends, and society. None of these came from God.

  And, that was the first step. I knew that I was a being independant of deities. My existence as what Christians would deem a "good person" was not because God wanted people to be good people, but because I, idependantly of my belief in God at the time, wanted to be a "good person."

  The next step was to take a look at the notion that God is both Omnipotent and benevolent. I found out that, according to the Christian faith, one could have no sins whatsoever, save not believing in Chistianity, and even be a kind, loving, generous, cheritable, even chaste person and still go to Hell because this particular person didn't believe that the Christian god was the reason he was such a good person. I also realized that there are still thousands of people in the world who have not even heard of the Christian god, yet still become what the Christian would deem a "good person." These people tend to be those living in "primitive" tribes, but they are souls nonetheless, and are no less important than any other individual. Yet they do not have the option, let alone the reason, to believe in Christianity, and are therefore going to Hell.

  The final step was to learn that this independance was not something that only happened with me. People around the world were, and are, making decisions of morality and ethics based not on what their deity would prefer they do, but based upon what would have the most positive outcome for the most people involved. The best component that most all religions have in common is the belief that each one holds that it is the only "holy" religion, and each one holds that it, alone, is the reason that people are moral, or ethical. Well, I didn't need to go to one place to engage in a mock of canabalism any more. I was fully ready to accept the responsibility for my own deeds, whatever their outcomes, without saying that God says that I should do this and, therefore, I really did do a good thing.

  After that, my continued education on religions, Christian and otherwise, cemented my belief that this world not only doesn't have a god, but doesn't need one either. The world is independant of celestial intervention. And, the people within it are held to be responsible for their own actions. Claiming the bible as a justification no longer holds any sway for me.

  To clarify to the Christian and other believer yet missunderstander, I am not an atheist because it is easier for me. I am not an atheist due to lack of scientific or other evidence. I have my own experiences as emotional and spiritual evidence to the contrary of a god. And, I am not an atheist because religion has failed me.

  I am an atheist because I have realized that all the good in the world which the Chistian will try to attribute to God is only the result of the actions of human beings who make decisions on their own, not because God told them to pray on it. And all the evil in the world that the Christian will try to attribute to Satan is only the result of human beings who make decisions on their own, not because Satan told them to act for their own self interests.

  Since becoming an atheist, I have also become a writer, big brother, debator, and all around nice guy. I have experienced moments in which I seem to be of such focus that a human being shouldn't naturaly come accross this, but I have found that these moments come from my own passion and self-control.

  Atheism isn't always an issue of loosing faith, sometimes it's an issue of finding out that you don't need it. (wingedbeast)