By Nathan ~
I am 37 and an ex-Christian
Growing up in a Christian home I had seen and heard it all: the ranting and preaching from family members and church pastors of how faithful and loving god was; how if you just had more faith he will work things out in your life; you would grow closer to him and that things would get better if you continued your walk with him, etc.; That he had a plan for each of us but he never forces it on you, because of our own choice of free will; that he is all knowing, loving, merciful and a oh just so great invisible god!
The reality is I spent most of my adult life trying but never being able to live up to his and others perceived high expectations for righteous and godly living. The faith that I lacked just reinforced my feelings of guilt and inadequacy and I feel damaged emotionally to this day from my experiences with the faith.
In my heart of hearts I always felt that I couldn't just be me, be who I really was to the world and to myself without the constant surveillance of my every thought by god keeping me in line and the ever watchful eyes of others in the fold lest I dash my food upon a stone.
The faith that I lacked just reinforced my feelings of guilt and inadequacy and I feel damaged emotionally to this day from my experiences with the faith. I also had found that this rigid process of belief caused incredible long lasting harm in my relationships with others. I have come to the realization in my case that god is the fear of others, their disapproval, rejection, judgment, social attack, or ostracism by fellow Christians and the social pressures for living ungodly or by having doubts you will get the boot and thrown out of the club.
Also on the flip side of living with non-believers knowing you're Christian and their judgments, criticism and disdain for you being a hypocrite when you sinned and some liked to make sure you knew it and that you really aren't better than them after all.
All of this made my life a living hell of unworthiness and sapped most of all the joy as well and to cope I alienated and avoided most people. Religion can really cause damage to people in my opinion and I wish I was never exposed to it as a child.
I was a flawed, dirty, unworthy sinner at birth and somehow responsible? For what beings in a garden called Eden and what they had chosen decided for me already that I was born in sin by default. That I have a life to look forward to consisting of a long up hill battle to redeem myself to a god through a life of self denial and by believing in a man I have never seen and to take others words for it, with no real proof of ever having existed and give unto him my most utter reverence and praise for eternity.
Christianity to me now today after studying what freethinkers have expressed on the matter like Hitchens, Harris and Dawkins etc seems constrictive, circular, limited by the knowledge of the people at that time, non-evolving, outdated, stuck in the Bronze Age, pie in the sky thinking, threats of eternal damnation for not choosing the right team, casting your responsibility of wrong doing onto someone else... Jesus, a boring and mind-numbing bible that never really caught my interests in a real meaningful way anyways, full of the killing of children, destruction and death, slavery, racism, hatred, fear, jealousy, etc.
If this is God as he is in the bible I finally decided just these past few months, than I want nothing more to do with him. I am free to live as I please, ethically and with my own ingrained morality that I never needed to be taught and especially from Christianity in the first place.
Now I am in the recovery stage after my deconversion and it's has been a real eye opener to actually to be embracing the truth of reality. I still do feel the pangs of letting go of this long held belief that I was indoctrinated into since a child. I feel I am experiencing is some ways another growing up period in my life now and it is painful... letting go of religion and it's false certainties and comforts.
I accept that once we die that is all and I am ok with that because it is the nature of things, how it is for every living thing and how things really actually are... fairy tales not included.
I am 37 and an ex-Christian
The reality is I spent most of my adult life trying but never being able to live up to his and others perceived high expectations for righteous and godly living. The faith that I lacked just reinforced my feelings of guilt and inadequacy and I feel damaged emotionally to this day from my experiences with the faith.
In my heart of hearts I always felt that I couldn't just be me, be who I really was to the world and to myself without the constant surveillance of my every thought by god keeping me in line and the ever watchful eyes of others in the fold lest I dash my food upon a stone.
The faith that I lacked just reinforced my feelings of guilt and inadequacy and I feel damaged emotionally to this day from my experiences with the faith. I also had found that this rigid process of belief caused incredible long lasting harm in my relationships with others. I have come to the realization in my case that god is the fear of others, their disapproval, rejection, judgment, social attack, or ostracism by fellow Christians and the social pressures for living ungodly or by having doubts you will get the boot and thrown out of the club.
Also on the flip side of living with non-believers knowing you're Christian and their judgments, criticism and disdain for you being a hypocrite when you sinned and some liked to make sure you knew it and that you really aren't better than them after all.
All of this made my life a living hell of unworthiness and sapped most of all the joy as well and to cope I alienated and avoided most people. Religion can really cause damage to people in my opinion and I wish I was never exposed to it as a child.
I was a flawed, dirty, unworthy sinner at birth and somehow responsible? For what beings in a garden called Eden and what they had chosen decided for me already that I was born in sin by default. That I have a life to look forward to consisting of a long up hill battle to redeem myself to a god through a life of self denial and by believing in a man I have never seen and to take others words for it, with no real proof of ever having existed and give unto him my most utter reverence and praise for eternity.
Christianity to me now today after studying what freethinkers have expressed on the matter like Hitchens, Harris and Dawkins etc seems constrictive, circular, limited by the knowledge of the people at that time, non-evolving, outdated, stuck in the Bronze Age, pie in the sky thinking, threats of eternal damnation for not choosing the right team, casting your responsibility of wrong doing onto someone else... Jesus, a boring and mind-numbing bible that never really caught my interests in a real meaningful way anyways, full of the killing of children, destruction and death, slavery, racism, hatred, fear, jealousy, etc.
If this is God as he is in the bible I finally decided just these past few months, than I want nothing more to do with him. I am free to live as I please, ethically and with my own ingrained morality that I never needed to be taught and especially from Christianity in the first place.
Now I am in the recovery stage after my deconversion and it's has been a real eye opener to actually to be embracing the truth of reality. I still do feel the pangs of letting go of this long held belief that I was indoctrinated into since a child. I feel I am experiencing is some ways another growing up period in my life now and it is painful... letting go of religion and it's false certainties and comforts.
I accept that once we die that is all and I am ok with that because it is the nature of things, how it is for every living thing and how things really actually are... fairy tales not included.
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