"THE MOST FAMOUS MAN IN AMERICA: THE BIOGRAPHY OF HENRY WARD BEECHER," by Debby Applegate, Doubleday, 527 pages, $27.95

The sex scandal in which Henry Ward Beecher was the protagonist involved Elizabeth Tilton, a member of the congregation Beecher preached to each Sunday. According to Tilton, the sex did not come "out of low or vulgar thoughts either on her part or his, but always from pure affection and a high religious love." She felt "justified before God in her intimacy with him."

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By Lorena

When I was a Christian, I was in a permanent semi-paranoid state. The heathens, I’d been told, were always watching me, to see if I really was a faultless Christian.
My fellow Christians were always watching me for signs of backsliding, so they could straighten me out with “wise” words of timely, “loving,” advice.

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sent in by David Maas

I have decided to write about how I left. I was born into a Christian family. I went to a Christian school from K to 12, so I had 13 years of day in day out indoctrination. The church I was brought up in was the Christian Reform church and I was treated quite well. My family was poor and they did help us out a lot financially, so we wouldn't become homeless and go hungry. This also one of the reasons I stayed a Christian so long.

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Saying those words, Jesus love me, what do they mean? It means everything to some that choose to believe. But in all reality it means you're replacing a character whom you've been told is very admirable, for the love that you never received as a child by your own father. If you do not believe it, examine your past life, how many times have you been told by your biological father that he loves you or showed genuine affection towards you? Be truthful now, how many times as opposed to how many times your mother told you that she loves you and cares for you?

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sent in by Nvrgoingbk

I can't remember a time when I didn't believe in God. I was adopted at three months old into a Catholic family and I remember watching the story of Jesus on television at Christmas time. It broke my heart that he was crucified and treated so poorly when all he did was love us. Catholic statues were common around my home as were the repetitive prayers we said every night but never understood. My parents were not particularly religious. They were what I would consider soft secularists. They believed what they believed, but they didn't force it down our throats. They were hypocrites when it served them. We didn't frequent mass too often. We attended on Christmas and Easter and there was a brief period we attended regularly, but it was short lived. Sitting through mass was agonizing for me: All of the kneeling and standing, all of the prearranged services. Still, as I said before, my family was not particularly religious, so it was easy to not give Jesus and God much thought throughout my childhood years.

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by Valerie

THE B-I-B-L-E, YES, THAT’S THE BOOK FOR ME.” WE SANG LOUDLY, SCRUBFACED, girls in dresses and boys in tidy pants. The year was probably 1968 or ’69, and scores of us were attending Vacation Bible School, a week-long event like a day camp that is still held each summer by churches across America. One summer, not long ago, my nephews attended four of them back to back. Some churches use commercially published curricula; some make up their own. The advertised materials have catchy themes, like “Power Up! (Jesus helps you to power up),” or “Rickshaw Rally (Racing to the Son),” or “Mission Possible (sharing your faith with your friends).” If the church is large enough, children split by age groups and, in the company of their peers, do art activities, sing songs, and listen to stories taught by enthusiastic volunteers. Bible Schools vary, but they share the same intent: to introduce children to God’s wonderful Word. “I stand alone on the Word of God—the B-I-B-L-E.

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In a trial outcome Friday that apparently stunned members of an Athens, Ohio, church congregation, a Hocking County jury convicted the church's pastor of committing public indecency in a state park lavatory on May 15.

"Oh, no," blurted out one audience member in the packed courtroom, as the jury foreman in Hocking County Municipal Court read out the guilty verdict against 57-year-old H. Willard Love, senior minister of the Athens Church of Christ.

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By Zack Pelta-Heller, AlterNet

The Rapture is headed for New York City, and just in time for Christmas. In Left Behind: Eternal Forces, a Christian-themed videogame due out this October, the New York skyline smolders during the End of Days, the faithful have been called up to heaven, and the remaining New Yorkers are engaged in an epic clash between the Tribulation Forces and the Antichrist's army of Global Community Peacekeepers (aka UN Peacekeepers).

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By John Loftus

Here are some tough questions for the Christian that I posted on my other Blog, depending on his or her particular theology:

Can God be surprised? Surprise is the basis of laughter. Can God laugh?

Can God think? Thinking means weighing alternatives. But if God knows everything then can God think?

Is God metaphysically free? Did God ever choose his character and his moral standards? Does God ever know what it is to make a choice?

Is God Good?


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Michelle Goldberg says progressives need to wake up and pay attention to the enormous — and growing — influence of the radical Christian right.

"I don't want to be alarmist, but this is actually quite alarming," Michelle Goldberg said. She was referring to the subject of her new book, "Kingdom Coming: The Rise of Christian Nationalism," which chronicles the steady rise of the neocons of Christianity.

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Former Peace Lutheran Church Associate Pastor, Gregory Briehl, faced two judges. A General District Court judge set a $2,500 bond for 52-year-old Briehl on two counts of videotaping non-consenting adults and a Juvenile Relations Court judge set the bond at $100,000 for another charge, 20 counts of possession of child pornography.

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I have just stumbled onto this site - praise the lord! - and am jumping right in before I go back and read any more testimonials. Christianity is making me sick, literally. I was born into atheism, so I already have a foundation of non-religiosity, and I am finding my christian friends' attempts to convert/preach to me and so on make me queasy and extraordinarilly uncomfortable. Having never "believed" in anything other than reality I did not have any lights going off or personal "aha's!", so their prostelytizing puts me at a disadvantage.

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by Wayne Adkins

Each time an article appears somewhere that carries the words “intelligent design” and “creationism” in the same sentence the Discovery Institute feels compelled to respond. They desperately want to distance themselves from biblical creationists because they know it will hurt their chances of slipping intelligent design into classrooms in our public schools. The latest attempt by Bruce Gordon to disassociate intelligent design with creationism is over the top. He actually claims that “most current ID theorists of consequence not only are not creationists, some of them aren’t even theists”. Most are not creationists?

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sent in by Nicholas Brosz

Logic versus religion. Thus is the concept that many people have fought and died for throughout humanity's existence. Some have fought and died for it, while far more have fought and died against it. Here is the result of my thoughts concerning the Bible and stories/miracles mentioned therein.

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by John W. Loftus

How many sermons have Christians heard about Joseph and Potipher’s wife where the preacher asked something like this: “How many men would've been able to overcome this temptation?” And they conclude with, “I fear not many men here could’ve overcome this.” What are preachers saying here?...That Joseph was a man of faith and had real strength of character, but most men, even Christian men, do not. And yet when a Christian (former one) like me actually does succumb to such a temptation, these same preachers are quick to condemn me. Isn't that odd? Which is it?

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Hello everybody,

I'd like you to know about this workshop coming right up. Feel free to call me and discuss. 510-292-0509

Marlene Winell

Now registering:

A weekend intensive for moving beyond religious indoctrination and reclaiming a life of joy, creativity, and connection. Led by Marlene Winell, Ph.D.

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A Pensacola evangelist who owns the defunct Dinosaur Adventure Land in Pensacola was arrested Thursday on 58 federal charges, including failing to pay $473,818 in employee-related taxes and making threats against investigators.

Of the 58 charges, 44 were filed against Kent Hovind and his wife, Jo, for evading bank reporting requirements as they withdrew $430,500 from AmSouth Bank between July 20, 2001, and Aug. 9, 2002.

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sent in by Shi

I don't even know where to start except to say that I am quite happy that I can see clearly now since my third eye has been restored. I no longer feel awkward, embarrassed, ashamed, uncomfortable, or guilty when I proudly and justifiable tell people that "No, I am not a believer in the program of Christianity and I don't go to church to take part in the distortion of God."

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I found the answers to many of the questions you posed. I too seem to know more about the Bible and what it teaches than almost every preacher I have ever met. Anf that was before I became a minister. And I too found it hard to find anyone who got it.

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You are playing Russian Roulette with Eternity. God will not allow your blasephemy to continue. Something will happen. Maybe you have already been judged and will not be allow to repent.

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WEST MEMPHIS, AR -- A community is shocked to learn that one of their religious leaders is facing criminal charges, but it's not just any charges he's facing. The West Memphis man is accused of secretly videotaping an underage girl and not only is the suspect a pastor, but he also is a newly-elected member of the Crittenden County Quorum Court.

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This post is excerpted from The Dark Side: How Evangelical Teachings Corrupt Love and Truth (www.lulu.com/tarico).

WHEN I WAS A CHILD, THE BIBLE WAS AS TIMELESS AS MY PARENTS. ALONG WITH
the foundations of the earth and the valleys of the sea, it had always
existed in its present, unchanging form. As a teenager, I spent hours
weekly studying its passages under the guidance of others, wiser and
more experienced than I. The contents of the Bible opened up to me. I
learned the basics of “biblical exegesis,” the methods by which Evangelicals
analyze scriptures phrase by phrase, word by word, even turning
to the original Greek or Hebrew to better mine the depths of meaning
layered into each perfect word of God. It never occurred to me to ask
the book’s history, because it had no history. Like God, it simply was.


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sent in by Dan

My wife and I were ultra religious up to a few years ago. If you had seen us, you would have suspected we were Amish or Mennonite (it doesn't help that we now live in Lancaster County, PA!). The women in our household wore head-coverings and I had a particular propensity toward wearing clothes that were often confused with the aforementioned religious communities. We have a LARGE family, have been home-schooling, attended church every week (some of my children and I participated in the church orchestra). At one time I aspired to the ministry and was an interim pastor for a mid-west church.

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sent in by Michelle

Even as a child, I remember sitting in the pew thinking, "no thinking person would believe this stuff". As a pastor's wife, I was embarrassed to think that other's wouldn't believe the shit that I did. I pushed those thoughts down deep, because I really thought my life depended on my willingness not to think. Now I look back and see I was transferring my own disbelief onto others.

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sent in by Chris

First off, I would like to say that I appreciate the many testimonies and stories on the site. It has given me hope and courage in the face of the trials I face daily with my decision to search for the truth as opposed to the Christian myth. Ever since I was baptised as an infant my life has been centered around the Christian religion. My mother's family is devout Catholic, which is actually quite rare in the state of Oklahoma. However, after my mother divorced my father, she decided to raise my brother and I as protestant Christians in my small, Baptist-run hometown due to her disgust with the Catholic Church's position on divorce.

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The senior pastor of Bloomington Illinois' Second Presbyterian Church has been put on medical leave following his arrest during a domestic dispute with his estranged wife, church officials said Monday.

The Rev. Ted Pierce has been charged with aggravated battery, criminal trespass to a residence and domestic battery after a June 29 incident. Prosecutors say he choked his wife, from whom he is separated, and threatened to kill her.

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Why are you so angry? It doesn’t make sense to be angry about God, since you don’t believe there is a God. You people are like talking to robots that only repeat their programming. I feel so sad for you. You haven’t truly experienced Jesus or you would never say the things you say. I accept that you don’t believe, but why be disrespectful of someone else’s religion? I don’t get it, why would you need encouragement in your ex-Christianity?

Various Christians regularly post these kinds of questions and quips to http://ExChristian.Net.

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sent in by Kitty

Everyone seems so free and liberated to get away from the oppressive Christianity. Am I the only one who had a really good time with it and am sad to leave it? My family is Christian but they are super cool and support me in anything. My Christian friends were awesome, real folks, not judgmental. I loved having a God that looked out for me and cared for me. I felt if I follow God, I would be led upon the best past for my life, and it seemed to work.

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sent in by A

I was born into a Lutheran family. My parents were both baptized Lutheran, married in a Lutheran church, and had each of their three children, of whom I was the youngest, baptized and confirmed into the Lutheran religion. I attended Sunday school and church pretty much every Sunday for the first 14 years of my life. I was in the church youth choir as well. When I was 12, we moved to another state because my dad was transferred. My father was an alcoholic, and was verbally and physically abusive to all three of us children, while my mother avoided confrontation to the point that she enabled him to get away with it.

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sent in by Charmika Stewart

Because I am a black American, I was born into a Christian family. I would be hardpressed to name just two other non-famous black atheists, and even the one I know is most definitely in the closet. For to be black is to be Christian in America. It's a cultural thing, I suppose, dating back to slavery. The church is a strong institution in the culture, where blacks get together and discuss life and bond, and for the longest time it was the only place that this was possible.

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by Ian

Dreams are interesting things. Sometimes they're random, sometimes they're cool. Sometimes they can bring us happiness, and sometimes they can bring us crushing despair.

But sometimes...they can have a message or two to bring us.

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I hope the Webmaster won't mind posting this. I just want to let everyone know that I am about to pay what is called in Judaism a "shiva call". This is like going to a wake for lack of a better explanation, although as is befitting the damn morose religion of Judaism it gets dressed up some. I have old ex-friends there some of home are wannabe Zionists (a lot of American Jews are wannabe Zionists, because they don't understand Zionism, they don't understand that right wingers and nationalist Jews in Israel will cheerfully break your arms for you if you go to the wrong neighborhood and say the wrong things.

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sent in by Matthew

I am not sure where to start. I have never been creative at writing, but I will try my best. The first time I remember learning about Christianity was in a Southern Baptist church when I was about 7 or 8 years old. And I also went to my mom's friend's church (which was charismatic). They would talk about things that I could not possibly understand such as "Israelites" or "Canaanites", etc. But, when I started going to Sunday School at the Southern baptist church, they would teach me generalized things about Jesus.

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