CRUCIFIED BY CHRISTIAN BEST FRIEND

By Teal ~

I welcome anybody's comments (or even comfort that the friend I describe below isn't completely toast) who has had the soul-crushing experience I have--maybe your own struggles can help me understand this. I'm a mature adult, former teacher, and was never really a Christian (unless you count boring Sundays-only 1960's Methodism as Christianity). I am part Native American, and I believe in all the paths--except the ones that say they have the Only Path and condemn women, gay people, intellectuals, artists, etc. etc.

By college, I was firmly left-wing, feminist, anti-racism, and deeply involved in the human liberation politics of my day. I went on to become a college teacher, and was finally thrust out of that vast morass of ego-driven anti-education. (The boy profs didn't like really smart girl profs, and I was one.)

But life went on, I moved away from that, and found solace in the desert--I have rewarding work and still get behind all the liberation movements of our day, especially now working to defeat the hateful anti-gay and misogynist sentiments I see everyday on the streets and in the right-wing political media. And I was pretty at peace with that OK life until three years ago, when I reconnected with my best friend from high school, at a reunion.

Her parents while we were growing up were certifiable fanatics, and pounded hellfire and brimstone into their many children, especially my friend, who was the first-born. Besides, her mother had a reason to force her compliance: she needed her for free labor. So, gradually, over the years, my friend was, I guess, brainwashed. In spite of the crazy behavior I saw at her Pentecostal church, my friend was the sweetest, gentlest, most loving person I've ever known--she and I were close-close, intimate friends--I've never been closer to anyone.

Then along came the Someday-Gonna-Be-a-Rich-Guy-for-Jesus man, she married him, they moved away, and I was forgotten for decades. He was a loonie Xian (Of course! She was raised with the idea that her sole meaning in life was not to develop herself and her own talents, but to serve a male--who would become her god-spokesperson.)--now tells her everything she can and cannot do--knows where she is every minute. He won't let her pursue her art, because he requires that she only act in "god's service," doing only the things he tells her to do.

She'd seem completely OK and "with" me for awhile, then she'd sound like someone I didn't even know--almost like a robot--it was eerie--even her voice changed back and forth.Trouble is, my friend reached out to me with all four feet when we re-met--we were so close again--like no time had passed. Once at reunion, she said seeing me was her only motivation in coming. The husband was also there, watching like a hawk. After reunion, I continued encouraging my friend to be all she can be, and sent her praising and supportive things to help her do so. She seemed to begin to blossom.

But here's the odd part--when we talked in person at reunion, and later, when we both went back home, on the phone, she would kind of click in and out--she'd seem completely OK and "with" me for awhile, then she'd sound like someone I didn't even know--almost like a robot--it was eerie--even her voice changed back and forth.

After weeks of her pulling back, and then moving back in close to me--finally, it came--she wrote an email to tell me she didn't want any other communication with me. And that was that. From the emotion and intensity of that reunion to goodbye in on fell swoop. To have her be so incredibly cruel to me and abandon me in that cold way has challenged my faith in people.

So--what do I do? I'm anguished that someone so special, so brilliant, and so deserving, is so brainwashed that she seemingly doesn't even have a self anymore. The battered women's center tells me I can do nothing if my friend doesn't herself want out--so hard to accept!

To compound everything, they're rich and powerful--politically and otherwise--high social status--so, if she's as materialistic as many Fundies are, she will find that part of her life very attractive. Of course, she never worked--at a job.

The only comfort I find was in her brief cryptic words at reunion, for the five minutes we had together alone--she said: "I once realized that I'd gone from being in my father's totally controlling household directly into my husband's totally controlling household--and I REBELLED." So what in hell happened?

Please, you've all broken free of that mental cancer, or are in the process. Give me some hope here. Or just tell me: Am I a g-damned fool for caring? I would especially like to hear from Moderator Lilith, whose generation I am. (I would be grateful to exchange emails with you.)

Divorcing God

By Bob903 ~

For me, the God I understood as loving, kind,etc; was very abusive. I am going to share my definition of Atheist, but let me just try not to offend those that really understand physical abuse. I have never been in, nor do I want to make light of those who have struggled to survive and live past a physical and emotionally violent relationship.

My first memories of prayer and how to pray came from a Southern Baptist missionary, my father. This man believed the bible was the word of god and did everything humanly possible to live by his belief. This man was not a hypocrite. I learned how to pray by listening to his prayer, Lord, not my will, but thy will be done. I want what you want, I will do what you choose for me. This was a total willingness to sacrifice self, reasoning and logic to find Gods will. In the broader since he always acknowledged when something went wrong, He missed Gods will. If he had only, listened better to God this would not have happened.

If you work with me a little, I will use two labels on myself: battered woman and divorced. Hopefully when I finish the label atheist can be seen as the primary label with divorced and battered as subsets. Ever person is different. My brother was able to grow up in the same household and respond entirely different. He never allowed the religious dogma to control his life. Emotionally it appears I was willing and ready to be abused. As so often a sheltered battered spouse will return to the spouse once the perceived danger is past. Every counselor will say no,no, don't. It does not matter, there she (he) goes with the kids back to the abuser. This is my story, no matter how many times I failed Gods will, I was back in his arms, no intentions of leaving.

As I look back I can see I was really living in an abusive fantasy world. As for me your logic, facts, reasoning did not matter. I was safe with my protector, my God. Don't know how or why, but somewhere I decided to question, maybe I always did. I think I really learned to question because I was always missing the will of god. I lived as a preacher for 14 years. I feel I failed miserably. I was never successful and never had a crowd follow me. It was just a few followers. Little or no money, just simply a failure. This probably was the crack in the damn, which would eventually put me in the process of working out my Divorce with God. I never called it a divorce. I did not go in a straight line. Back and forth, back and forth, I was way too vested in my god to leave. I was 66 years old before I got the nerve to walk to a shelter. I stuck my head into the East Texas Free Thinkers group. I listened intensely as others shared their story. I was not alone, my story was not unique. I arrived as a choice, I stayed as a choice. Looking back, when I went to this meeting and identified with the non believers, it was like sending God my divorce papers.

I have never gone thru a marriage divorce, but for me it was scary stuff divorcing my god. Now to the word Atheist. Yes, I have read blog after blog on the subject. Let this be my definition. An atheist is no more than a person in a failed marriage, after legal documents are signed, adding the divorced label. As I divorced God, I identify as an atheist. I do not accept or acknowledge the god of my youth. To me Atheist is no more than a label saying I am divorced from the god of my youth. (At he beginning I labeled myself agnostic, be honest with you, I think there is much to do about nothing when we split hairs trying to tweak the difference between agnostic, atheist, etc. Like a divorce, it may take years before you label yourself single, without the need to also says divorced. I look forward to dropping the atheist label.). Smile, I do know atheist do not have knowledge of any god...

To take from a famous speech, I have a Dream. I have a dream that my grand kids and great grand kids will never know the god of my youth. I have a dream that they will never need to understand what an atheist is. They will just say that is what people used to call themselves. Since they never had to divorce god,they have no need for the label. (PS: all kinds of legal and weird things happen during and after a divorce. Atheist definitely have earned some of the scorn religious folks have given them.)

Jesus is God. . . Are You Kidding Me?!

By WizenedSage (Galen Rose) ~

Atheists get to be non-believers for many reasons, but perhaps the most common is finally getting around to reading the nastier and dumber parts of the Bible. What they find there is an enormous number of outrageous stories, contradictions, and head spinning incoherence.

The guys who pulled these texts together into the “official” canon provided all the evidence anyone should need to know that the Bible is not the work of a perfect god but of primitive men. Had those men done their selecting and editing a little more carefully, they might have fooled a whole lot more of us. But as they stand, those texts, over and over, make the sensible reader want to just scream, “Are you kidding me?!” In this vein, the “Jesus is god” story is one of my favorites.

In standard Christian teaching, Jesus is god. This dogma is expressed in the trinity concept where god, Jesus, and the Holy Ghost are thought to somehow be one entity in a kind of “new math” where 1+1+1=1. There is also support for this Jesus is god concept in several passages of the New Testament. For example, in John 14:9, Jesus says, “Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father! So why are you asking me to show him to you?" Also, in John 10:30, Jesus says, "The Father and I are one." Now that statement looks to me to be pretty definitive as to Jesus’ opinion on the matter; short and sweet and in unequivocal language. So far, so good.

But, with the Bible it’s never that simple of course, so, not surprisingly, there are confounding passages such as Mark 10:17 where Jesus says, “Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone." Nevertheless, all (or nearly all-) Christian factions insist that Jesus is god. And, if we take them at their word, we get a wonderful “Are you kidding me?!” moment in Matthew 26.

In that chapter, as Jesus is about to be taken into custody, a disciple brandishes a sword, but Jesus tells him to put it away and says, “Thinkest thou that I cannot now pray to my Father, and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels?” So, if Jesus is god, isn’t he speaking here of praying to himself?

Then, 3 times in that same chapter Jesus actually prays to god saying he wants to be spared, but he is not spared. So, if Jesus is god, then who is he praying to? And, worse still, didn’t Jesus himself guarantee that whatever anyone prays for in his name will be granted? The relevant passages here are Mat 21:22, "And all things you ask in prayer, believing, you will receive," and John 15:7, "If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you.”

Doesn’t all this suggest that Jesus was mistaken, and perhaps delusional? He says things that are obviously not true about prayers being answered, and even proves them to be false when his prayers don’t even work for himself. Yet, he is supposed to BE god himself! The alternative is that those guys who wrote those texts did so without any godly assistance and screwed up badly in sending mixed messages. Either way, the Bible is utterly incoherent when it comes to the question of whether Jesus is god!

Yet, Christian leaders, across the board, insist that the essential Christian message is clear and binding. Are you kidding me?!

Confession

By Carl S ~

There are different types of confession. There is confessing to wrongdoing, confessing as used in praising, and the romantic one expressed in the song title, “I‘m confessin' that I love you.”

An old adage: Confession is good for the soul. Supposedly, ordinary people do feel better, even relieved, after “fessing up” to a misdemeanor. Another kind of confession was one common in my primary family, where each member was encouraged, in the words of my dad, to join him and to “get it (your grievance) off your chest.” This didn't resolve anything, because he was always drunk at the time he said it. But, such confessions did have the result of venting pent-up resentments. Nevertheless, both in one-on-one interactions and societies, confession is usually accepted as a good idea. This is deceiving. Let's look at confession as a loss of power and a tool to control through power.

Police officers interrogate suspects in order to obtain confessions. Sometimes their pressure methods are so successful that innocent people have confessed to crimes they didn't commit. Police- obtained confessions are used in courtrooms as assumed proof of guilt, even accepted by juries as such. Catholic priests confess only to other priests. (In the secular world, pedophilia is a crime, ergo, priests hearing and withholding confessions to pedophilia are “partners in crime.”)

A practice of the former Soviet Union under Stalin, and Communist China under Mao, was to obtain public confessions through private tortures and/or, public humiliations, which was very successful. After all, this system had a strong foundation; it worked for the Inquisition interrogators and witch-hunters. Whether by traditional religions or state religions, confessions are used for control, for power. Cults of all kinds depend on confessions as mandatory.

Confessions are used as control power over others by creating SHAME for one's ordinary human actions and feelings. They make shameful to oneself and others, feelings and actions which those powers do not approve of. They are ruling that you should be ashamed if you do not meet up with the expectations of whoever they claim to represent, i. e., themselves. Religious “authorities” assume that they have the right and duty to enforce shame on others, in any way they can get away with it. Haven’t you noticed this?

In common with secular powers creating shame where there is none in order to force confessions, religions re-create the man-mad structures for them; their own interrogation rooms, hermetically sealed from the outside world, whether in a church, mosque, confessional, cult group, etc. Within every one of these confines, with their emotionally controlled atmospheres, power is guaranteed. “Confessing to” and “confessing of,” are strongly encouraged. No one has the right to demand this of you, nor to expect you to openly allow yourself to be emotionally blackmailed.

If you are a sensitive, trusting individual, you ought to find yourself emotionally drained by the experience of “confessing your shameful faults,” whether you feel relieved or not. In doing so, you become even more dependent on the cleric, the cult leader, the congregation, for emotional, “spiritual,” support.What do these examples mean to us personally, in our experiences? Well, for those raised n the Catholic Church, confession is a private matter between confessor and priest. So, it’s possible that, if you are Catholic, your pastor knows more about you than your spouse, family, or friends. In revealing your secrets, you are relinquishing power over your private life to someone you don't really know. For those raised in other religions, public revelations can take the formula of, “I confess my sins, humbling myself before god, pleading for his mercy and the forgiveness of all who I have offended.” You have made yourself vulnerable. This amounts to, in the words of an old wise man, “Giving a man a stick to beat you with.” (Or a whole congregation!)

If you are a sensitive, trusting individual, you ought to find yourself emotionally drained by the experience of “confessing your shameful faults,” whether you feel relieved or not. In doing so, you become even more dependent on the cleric, the cult leader, the congregation, for emotional, “spiritual,” support. Consider on the other hand that you, and others like you, receive attention you would not get from other sources, in any other settings. You are embraced because of your neediness; you are “special” by being “saved.” Saved by who, salvaged from yourself, for what purposes of others? In “turning your life over to the lord,” don't you actually relinquish control over your moral decisions to others? Is it worth that much to you?

Finally, other examples of popular confessions: Celebrities and politicians confessing infidelities, illegal drug use, performance drug overuse, etc. (After being found out, of course.) In a sense, there is connection here between them and those who stand up in congregations to proclaim their sins; along with such “humbling” there is a kind of bragging in the confessor who was bold enough to do the things we wouldn't.

If there are those who confess under certain circumstances to crimes they didn't commit, do not others, under similar circumstances, confess to BELIEVING what they don't?

If you feel the need to confess, do so with a wife or friend or shrink; someone who you can trust, who you have confidence in, who won’t betray you. Stay away from clergy; don't trust them. (During the inquisition, clergy demanded that the faithful betray their friends. The methods used to achieve the will of god know no limits.) How many women and children alone can attest to being molested or propositioned by clergy? Enough to equal the population of New York State?

So, if “confession is good for the soul,” for whose good is it? Your experiences appreciated.

I Never thought I would

By Tim R. ~

I never, in a million years, would have thought that I would lose my faith in God.

I was "saved" when I was seven years old at a vacation bible school at the church my family attended. It was a Wednesday night. We had finished our game time and snacks, and we were all filing into the sanctuary to here the message. The preacher began telling how God made us and loved us very much, but that we were sinners, unable to do the right thing and obey God. He explained that God loved us so much that he sent Jesus to die for our sins so that if we believed in him, we would go to heaven when we died instead of hell.

I had heard this message many times before and was convicted by it. That night, I decided I would pray to be saved. I walked down to the front where the preacher, my aunt, and cousin all lead me in a prayer to ask Jesus into my heart. It was a very emotional experience for me. I believed I was truly saved.

I spent pretty much all of my teen years actively involved in my youth group. I was very passionate about knowing God and learning more about how to follow him and please him. At about the age of fourteen, I began reading the bible intensely. I discovered verses I had never heard preached before. I decided to pray and ask God to help me understand these verses even if it meant I had been wrong in my beliefs. Little did I know this was the beginning of my deconversion.

Slowly, over the years that followed, I began questioning more and more. All the while, I was an active Christian and firmly believed in Jesus and my salvation. Recently, I have been confronted with the evidence that the bible can't be true (this was the cornerstone of my beliefs). I had noticed the contradictions in the Bible for years, but had heard many convincing apologetic arguments that convinced me they weren't really contradictions.

Recently I found others that I cannot reconcile.

For instance, the contradictory accounts of Judas's death, and contradictory timelines of Jesus' activities in the gospels (events that explicitly say after this Jesus did that, then in another gospel it is the other way around). The final blow was the evidence that Judaism, as is shown in the Old Testament, morphed out of polytheism, that their original conception of God was a copy of the gods of the Canaanites who's religion predated theirs. Above all these things, the one thing that finally convinced me the Bible isn't true is the irreconcilable contrast between the genocidal Old Testament god and the New Testament god who loves EVERYONE and wants all to be saved.

Now, I'm struggling with fear, having no one to talk to about all this. That's why I'm here sharing my story. I need help.

The Fear That Passes Understanding

By xtify ~

I finally decided to tell some of my story, for whatever it is worth.

My parents became born again Christians when I was seven years old. Prior to that, my childhood was full of bad experiences of domestic violence and bullying from my older siblings (I was the fifth child of six). Things had been so bad right before they converted that both my parents were regularly attempting suicide. Both my mother and father would take the gun with them out behind the barn and tell us all they were going to end their lives and then fire the weapons so we would all be in tears. Then, thankfully, we would see them coming back to the house and we would hug them and thank them for staying alive. Whatever was going on inside their mentally ill minds, I guess they were coming to the end of their ropes, and then, the ANSWER presented itself.

A couple who were pastoring the Pentecostal church in a nearby town somehow became involved with my parents. I am unclear as to the details of what happened but one day, my parents sat me and my little brother down at the table to tell us the “good news”. They told me that Jesus died for them to have life and that he was coming back to rescue them in the air. They said that things were going to change for the better and that all things were new again. This was very good news indeed! My parents asked me if I wanted to accept Jesus into my heart and the answer was clearly YES! I remember praying and then my parents told me that now I too was going to be raptured with Jesus, and I felt a tremendous ecstatic relief that things were all new now and that I was saved.

We started going to the Pentecostal church in the nearby town every Sunday morning and night, and every Wednesday and also to any other weekly church special events and services. My first memory of that church was that there was a big note board at the front of the congregation for the early Sunday school part that had a tally of how many “fish” each person had brought in. It was a typical guilt session about how you had to get your friends and family into that church or else they were going to have to be left behind to face the tribulation. I was eager to learn all the details at that point and I quickly learned that after Jesus rescued the people who had accepted him into their hearts, he was leaving Earth and the devil was taking control and that he was going to torture everyone and cut off peoples’ heads. The ecstasy began to wear off and fear started to take over from then on.

It was the early ‘80s and the Pentecostal church was very strict about what sin was. My “new” life began to feel even more dreary than prior to my parents being born again. The mental issues with my parents started to surface again; however, this time after the tension built and there was a blowup, they would pray and ask forgiveness. This seemed to be progress at the time, and with all the church attendance, my parents were constantly surrounded by people and I guess that was a bit helpful for them. They were learning (or being convicted of, as it was called) many things about what they needed to do to stay on the list of who was going to be raptured. Having any friends who were not going to the Pentecostal church was a big no no.

My parents began evangelising all my relatives. Prior to that, I was allowed to spend time with my grandparents, but my parents had tried to convert them and my Grandparents said they were already Christians (they were Anglicans). I learned that this was far worse than just being a sinner. My Grandparents were deceived into a false sense of security and they were like the Pharisees. I remember my parents telling my Grandfather that it was wrong for him to watch “soaps”. I didn’t know what they meant but I put that on my bad list of new things not to do. My grandmother said Jesus wasn’t about judging others and my mother, highlighted bible in hand, quickly found the verse about Jesus coming to divide the daughter against her mother and read it to us all. After all the evangelism attempts, we were ostracised for a long time from extended family. There were no more Christmas parties with family from that point on.

At first I was certain of my salvation and that lasted well, a few months. But, as time went on, the sin list got longer and longer. Each week we would hear even more about what was wrong with this or that:

• No more going to the movies (which I had only been able to once in my life prior to that)
• No more listening to the radio or to records, no more dancing to the devil - only to the lord and only at church in the aisle and not if you were a kid.
• No more television, especially the smurfs! I learned at church that Smurfette was having orgies with all of them, but I didn’t know what the word orgie meant until my late teens. I just knew this was bad.
• No going to honky tonks! (I lived in rural Canada and we didn’t know what they were, but Jimmy Swaggart hated them and they were bad).
• No associating with any other children unless you are trying to fish them!

And then, no more toys. No cabbage patch dolls that I really wanted – they were demon possessed. And, no more Barbie dolls – she dressed like the devil wanted her to.

The list got longer and longer each week and my parents were taking it all at face value trying to do everything they could to stay on the rapture list. The end times were coming any day! Any day the trumpet was going to sound and we would meet him in the sky. We had to be ready to go, or else we would be left behind. My parents had shut out everyone that wasn’t part of their church. This had economic consequences for us as my father was a builder and got most of his business through a network of people he had already condemned for smoking, drinking and being bad. We were struggling to make ends meet and to give money to the church and to Jimmy.

I began to doubt my own salvation, not the concept because I thought it was all true, but my personal salvation. Was I really special enough to be one of his chosen few? The little self worth that I had began to deteriorate the more I questioned my worthiness. Why would Jesus choose me when he could look into my heart and know that I actually liked dancing to satan’s music and that I really liked the demonic toys? Even though I wasn’t allowed to have them, I knew he could see in my heart that I liked them and this made me scared. The only toys I was allowed to get were sold by a lady in the church. They were incredibly expensive for the times. One single doll would sell for $140, but it praised Jesus with a little plastic record inside of it. It was ugly and I hated when I got it and only it for Christmas. But why didn’t I like it better than the Cabbage patch kids? Why wasn’t god’s doll more appealing? I worried that I was one of the devil’s goats and not a sheep at all.

There was also the issue of speaking in tongues. Most people in my church believed that if you didn’t speak in tongues, you were not going to be raptured. Again, I was so terrified to be left behind because I had not experienced this in any real way. Yes, I tried many times to do it and prayed and asked for the spirit to take over, but every time I said ‘shundala mahundai’, I knew it was just me doing it.

Then, Jimmy Swaggart came to Toronto and my whole family went down to see him at Maple Leaf Gardens. Normally, that was a place of the devil as all stadiums, sporting events and music concerts were strictly banned by God, but Jimmy needed a huge venue. There was to be a pouring out of the spirit there and the whole sermon was about getting baptised in tongues of fire. The altar call was about getting filled with this and securing your place in the rapture, so I left my seat way up in the stadium to go down to get Jimmy to finally do it right for me. Unfortunately I got stuck behind everyone trying to cram themselves down the stairways and I missed the prayer. I couldn’t even hear it really. I was full of panic and I began screaming and going mental. My parents were asking me what was so wrong and I told them about wanting to be baptised in the spirit and not getting to. They said I would get another chance and to trust God’s timing, but I wasn’t so sure. They didn’t know about my salvation doubts.

The fear of being left behind began to take over everything. My parents were doing everything they could to stay saved. They were renting the town hall to sponsor travelling evangelists. They were setting up tract booths at local fairs at their own expense and making us kids stand in them to give them out and help lead people to say the sinner’s prayer. No one ever reacted with interest like they did in the roll playing sessions that my church had. Instead, they ridiculed us, laughed and called us names. I felt embarrassed and stupid. Other kids were having fun at the fair and I was in a long dress stuck behind a booth. I hated it and I wished I wasn’t doing it but my parents loved it. I knew that Jesus knew I hated it.

At church, I was a Crusader. This was a children's group ministry at the Pentecostal church. Imagine, a children's ministry in the 80’s named after the crusades! We had to march like soldiers and have our uniforms really neat. It was based on the verse about putting on the full armour of God and using the sword of the spirit. This was the church’s answer to Brownies and Beavers, which were considered demonic. I had been a Brownie when I was younger and I did remember dancing around some owl or something with mushrooms and frogs. But, ceramic owls, mushrooms and frogs were considered demonic at the time and so I had to quit. Both my sisters had become Girl Guides when they were younger and my Grandmother was involved, but it was considered bad so I was a Crusader instead.

Any adult attending church could volunteer to take over a children's’ group and there were no police checks or anything at that time. In retrospect, it was usually people with major problems who would volunteer. Sometimes they would roughhouse us too much or be extremely strict about uniforms and crap. Looking back, most of them would never be allowed to work with children by today’s standards. I remember kids being physically disciplined but thankfully I wasn’t one of them.
At Crusaders, they would make us testify to people on the street and go door-to-door. We would knock, then say our opening line, “if you died tonight, do you know where you would spend eternity?” Most people would say that we were rude and tell us to f#&* off. No one ever said, “tell me more about the good news”. When I was embarrassed, my nasty, teenage sister-in-law who volunteered (my oldest brother was a lot older than me... and her) would corner me and say “are you embarrassed of the Lord? Because if you are, the bible says that after you’re dead, you’ll be begging Jesus to say he knew you and he’ll tell the demons to take you to hell because he never knew you.

At around age 9, after seeing A Thief In The Night, I became dysfunctionally fearful. I was certain that Jesus had seen things in me he didn’t like and even though I had begged his forgiveness, I didn’t feel forgiven because the thoughts and feelings would again surface just the same. I felt I wasn’t really as sorry as I should be and I concluded that I mustn’t be as saved as the other people in my church. Even if I was saved, I wasn’t rapture ready and would have to go through the tribulation and get my head cut off to show Jesus I was for real. That meant that any day now, my parents were going to be gone in the twinkling of an eye and I was going to be left with no one to care for me through the 7 years. I began to hoard cans of soup and beans from the pantry. I had a stash of cans in my bedroom. I spent nearly all my spare time obsessing and drawing diagrams of underground holes with air pipes where I could hide from the antichrist. I scouted for locations all over our farm where I could dig my underground hole to hide, but I stopped short at actually digging it. The panic was continuous for a while because he was coming. At one point I heard a big rig horn from the highway nearby and thought it was the trump. My heart practically exploded.

Our church began to up the fear factor more and more before the end (1988). We were clearly living in end times. The world was going to be so bad soon. The church would put on a Heavens Gates – Hells Flames drama each year and more and more people were joining, at least temporarily, the church. It was time to build a gymnasium or something.
By the time I hit adolescence, I KNEW I was not going to be raptured or even saved. The youth group I attended sole emphasis was on sex and preserving your virginity. Because of my crappy childhood, I wasn’t able to choose to preserve something I didn’t have. I was damaged goods in terms of Pentecostalism and what the Lord wanted. I constantly cried to Jesus and God, why didn’t they let me be a virgin so I could be preserved and be valuable? I didn’t even get to decide and now I was worthless and unfit to get married and have children (the only way a woman could be saved). Know wonder why I felt like I really wasn’t saved all these years, I hadn’t been!

After years of lamenting, I stopped going and became ‘of the devil’. After that, the youth group had some sort of revirginizing ceremony or something where you could become a virgin again, but I was already gone. I was listening to the radio, and sinning. I had even tried smoking cigarettes by then. My mother would guilt trip me constantly. Why was I doing this to HER? It was relentless drama for many years.

My so called rebellion was in full effect and the church had lost me forever, until... well that is another story. I am almost 40 now, and an atheist. I wish I could say that I left the church at 15 and never looked back but that isn’t what happened. I got re-infected with the virus when I was in my late20’s after years of my mother guilt tripping me into feeling that all my problems were because I had turned my back on Jesus. My parents are in their mid 70’s and they still fight. They’ve had the worst relationship without any intimacy for decades (gross to think about that) and they are still living in mental torment and anguish over the past. So much for Jesus washing it all away.

Thank you for reading, I know it was long.

CRAZY CREATIONISTS

Sent in by DealDoctor ~

Did you see the debate between Bill Ney "the science guy" and the Crazy Creationist guru,Ken Ham which happened right at the come let us dupe you Creationist Museum in Kentucky? If there was anything that should change a fundamentalist I believe the bible from Genesis to Maps believer person it is the plain, simple statement of the facts by Bill Ney "the science guy". Then again you can't fix stupid and facts have a hard time changing the Faithful. Check out the debate in the video below and see what you think. Imagine if you were still a crazy headed dogma filled believer and that you were in the audience would what you hear change you? What happens when facts meet faith?

From Earth Chronicler to Planet Q

By Carl S ~

Hello, it's Diznie, reporting from Jerusalem, planet Earth, year here 38 C.E. (Some call this year 38 AD. I think it means “attention deficit,” which seems to be common around here.) I hear interesting stories about a man who made quite an impression around here within the last years of his life. (No, he’s not the one who has disciples preaching and begging in his name, the famous Harvey Chrishna.)

The word is that this man was a rabbi, meaning that he was one of the few around here who could read and write. And boy did he write! He had so much to say, and spent most of his life leaving behind his thoughts for posterity. In fact, it's claimed that all the books in this world could not contain the tales of his life. So, where are those writings? The word is that his followers destroyed them. Because they had their own version of their idol, they changed his “image” for their own purposes, and made up what they thought he should have said and done. I've concluded he said and did no such things as they assert. It really is suspicious that, when I dig deep for answers, I'm told “Don't dare to ask questions.”

Here's the story of his last days hereabouts: He was out walking on the Sea of Galilee, and a giant fish came up and swallowed him. He stayed in the fish for a couple of days, until he figured out a way to get free. He set a fire inside, which caused the fish to sneeze him out into the raging water. Unfortunately, when he washed up on shore, he was dead. (He fared better than his twin brother, James, who in Jesus’ name was nailed up and died horribly. Another story.)

Well, some locals found his body and put it in a nearby cave. There, he went from being a wooden head to become a real live boy. The word is that from there he descended (through a trap door in the cave?) into a place called “hell,” where one of its residents asked him, “Just how long must I repeat I’m sorry, before I’m forgiven and out of here? Forever?“ The descender replied, “Looks that way. Bye.”

Word is, he hung around for one, several, or forty (a popular number around here) days. No more writing, clearing up the confusing messages, or caring about what happened to people without him, etc., etc. He put on his red shoes and, clicking them together, closed his eyes and kept repeating, “There’s no place like home,” until he floated away into the sky toward... home? On landing, he turned to the last remaining of five magic fish he had for pets and said, “Mojo, we're not in Judea anymore.”

Now, some of the ladies (feminists?) claim that anything a man can do, they can do. They said that his mother, later on, took the same route he exited by. They say that, wearing her one glass slipper, she made a pumpkin miraculously turn into a coach. When she entered the coach, she turned it into a balloon which carried her away. One of those ladies predicted, “I'll bet that thousands of years from now they still won't find that other glass slipper... or that ark either.”

Time to sign off for now; just about used up my time. But I must add a conversation I had with someone interesting. He's called a “theologian,” and I found him behind a curtain, pulling and turning knobs and making odd noises. Nevertheless, he appears to be sane and honest, and speaks his mind. I told him all I've related here, and then some. This is what he said: “Yes, I too have heard many testimonies regarding the saving man. And I'm especially fascinated by the testimony of The Last Tea Party, where the Hatter, March Hare, and Door mouse, are revealed to be One Person. As a theologian, I must admit that everything you've said makes as much sense as anything I and my associates have managed to come up with... May I borrow from you?”

(with thanks to dealdoctor and Twinkletoes.)

Is the Hijab a Symbol of Diversity or a Symbol of Oppression?

By Valerie Tarico ~

Coca-Cola’s America the Beautiful ad on Super Bowl Sunday aimed to be a celebration of diversity, showcasing the many ethnicities that make up our modern social fabric. Right wing pundits jumped on the ad as a symbol that White Christian America is under assault. Not surprisingly, the Left reacted by praising and sharing the ad all the more because Right wingers hated it.

To criticize the ad from the Left, then, is like rooting for the wrong team in the Super Bowl itself. But according to some liberal and secular Muslims, Coca-Cola did women no favor by choosing the hijab as one of their symbols of diversity.

Americans value diversity in part because it is a proxy for another cherished value: freedom. Different styles of clothing and hair, skin colors, and family configurations are symbolic reminders that here in America we are free to pursue our quirks and interests, to become the best we can be, to love whom we love, and to worship (or not) as we see fit.

But for many secular Muslims and former Muslims, the hijab is not a symbol of freedom. It is a symbol of the fact that women in Islam are second class citizens and that this status is encoded in both sacred text and tradition, enforced by culture and law. The hijab lies at one end of a continuum with the burka, a portable fabric wall that prevents subject women from engaging fully with the world, and vice versa. It is a reminder that for millennia women have been chattel--literally property of men--and that this is the case in all of the Abrahamic sacred texts including the Bible and the Koran. This is why, in the Bible a rapist can be forced to buy and keep the damaged property. It is why, just last month in Dubai, a raped Austrian woman was told to marry her rapist.

For tens of millions of women around the world, Islamic head covering and isolation are not a matter of choice. In India, the practice of Purdah—keeping women shut away in walled compounds—has been a part of the culture since the time of the Mughal conquest. In Iran, Afghanistan, and some parts of Saudi Arabia women face fines, beatings, and worse for daring to show their hair. Before the U.S. deposed Saddam Hussein, Iraq had one of the highest rates in the Middle East of women in Ph.D. programs. Today, a woman with her head uncovered in some parts of Baghdad may be a target.

Many women claim that they wear the hijab voluntarily, and surely some do. But for others, such statements simply mask the overweening power of internalized ideology and of men. Faisal Saeed Al Mutar is a Washington D.C. based writer and the founder of Global Secular Humanist Movement who emigrated from Iraq. His life experience makes him skeptical about the hijab as a symbol of religious freedom:

Many women who wear the Hijab even in Western countries are forced to wear it due to a pressure from society or their families. I personally know of cases in which women have been beaten up or rejected by their families for refusing to wear the Hijab. My Egyptian friend Reem Abdul Razak was disowned by her father for taking the veil away. An Iraqi friend was kicked out from the house for refusing to wear the hijab any longer even though her reasons were not primarily anti-religious but rather because of the extreme summer heat in Iraq.

for millennia women have been chattel--literally property of men--and this is the case in all of the Abrahamic sacred textsMore insidious, perhaps, is the kind of psychological pressure that leads a woman to submit without question to practices that she otherwise would reject. Vyckie Garrison is a former member of the Christian Quiverfull movement, in which women are expected to birth as many babies as God deigns to give them. For years, as Garrison dutifully bore seven children at repeated risk to her life, she perceived that she participated in the movement willingly, even joyfully. Now founder of the blog No Longer Quivering, she looks back on those years through a different pair of eyes. Specifically, Garrison rues her inability to see how her own desires had been manipulated.

Quiverfull leaders such as Nancy Campbell are masters at SPIN. Playing on a woman’s sincere desire to serve the Lord wholeheartedly … they use the scriptures to convince a woman that she WANTS nothing more than to stay home, have lots of babies and serve her husband – even if these choices might cost her everything.

Garrison has written a series of articles on the question whether women like her who “choose” such roles, for example Michelle Duggar, are actually doing so freely.

In the same way that the fundamentalist Christian God allows people to exercise their free will by choosing between worshipping and serving Him or else burning in Hell forever – the Quiverfull woman must make the decision to trust God and perhaps die physically, or trust in the Pill and her own common sense – and die spiritually for all eternity. That’s not a choice – it’s an ultimatum.

When a Christian woman realizes that such a role is not for her, she often needs help and support from others who have found a way out. Dr. Marlene Winell is a California psychologist who works full time with “reclaimers” – people who are leaving conservative Christianity and rebuilding their lives. Among other things, she helps to connect clients with likeminded communities because, like Al Mutar’s friends who refused the hijab, many are rejected or shunned by Christian relatives. This can leave them alone, depressed, and destitute. When a situation crosses over into abuse, Winell works with them to get appropriate assistance and protection.

Al Mutar would like to see similar assistance and protections put in place in the U.S. so that women who are subject to Islamic edicts such as hijab against their will would have options.

I suggest creating a help line or a foundation to help those who are forced, giving them safe houses to escape to. A similar foundation was set up to prevent female genital mutilation by Ayan Hirsi Ali, and the AHA Foundation gets calls and emails on daily basis from desperate women.

Both England and France have higher rates of Muslim immigration that the U.S. and more open debate about hijab and other traditions that keep Muslim women covered or isolated from men. A French short movie that went viral recently explored sexism by having men play the parts of women. In one scene the protagonist arrives at his daycare to find that his provider (another man) is now wearing hijab at his wife’s request. The awkward scene is oddly poignant.

Maryam Namazie is a former Muslim who runs the “One Law For All” Campaign in England. Despite receiving death threats, Namazie is outspoken about equal rights for women, including the right for women to leave Islam and for Islamic women to dress as they choose. In recent months, when conservative Muslims in London won the right to gender segregated seating in university halls, Namazie organized secular Muslims and fought back.

Al Mutar sees the American Left as oddly naïve about the religion of his birthplace, not only about hijab and the freedom of women, but about freedom in and from Islam more broadly. He draws an analogy between the Islam of the 21^st Century and the Christianity of the Dark Ages, pointing to the thirteen Muslim dominated countries in which atheists are subject by law to the death penalty. He points to the nonexistence of gay rights and even the religiously sanctioned murder of gays in places like Saudi Arabia and Iran. He points to Morocco, which drops criminal penalties for rape as long as the rapist marries his victim. He points to how religious minorities are treated in places like Pakistan. He finds it painful that so often Western liberals—in reaction to the militarism and xenophobia on the Right—side against Middle Eastern liberals who share their quest for freedom and equality.

I understand the liberal impulse to respect multiculturalism, but aren’t human rights more important than cultures? Humans have rights, cultures don’t, cultures evolve and reform. Liberal friends and allies ask churches and pastors to accept gay rights and women’s rights. It is disrespectful and even racist to ask any less of mosques and Muslim leaders.

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Valerie Tarico is a psychologist and writer in Seattle, Washington. She is the author of Trusting Doubt: A Former Evangelical Looks at Old Beliefs in a New Light and Deas and Other Imaginings, and the founder of www.WisdomCommons.org. Subscribe to her articles at Awaypoint.Wordpress.com

Related at AwayPoint:

15 Bible Texts Reveal Why “God’s Own Party” is at War with Women

Was the Risen Jesus Originally Female?

What the Bible Says About Rape and Rape Babies

Turnaround

By Cody ~

Hello fellow Ex-Christians.

Early in January I posted my situation in the "Kind of Lost" headline and I read through all of the commentary and the supportive responses from all who did so.

I just wanted to say thank you to all who had anything to do with it like those who gave advice and their own personal testimony. I was about to type "thank you for your prayers" but I forgot that "wait a minute, these are ex-Christians, I doubt they do that".

Here is why I am thankful:

1. I told my parents, sisters, and my grandmother that I was no longer Catholic.

I explained to them that I never really felt anything "other-worldly in my life" and how I projected "God's voice" in my own head every time I prayed. I told them how my lector, Eucharistic minister, and mission trip services were for social reasons, not for theological purposes. I told them I agree with virtually none of the Catholic Church's stances (like same-sex marriage) and "how to live a good life". I also told them I see Jesus as a prophet but not as the Son of God (in like a Judaism or Islamic belief). Finally, I told them I do not support religion and how I will try to simply figure out what I believe in. I simply cannot call myself a Catholic if I fulfill these requirements.

All of them were very understanding (even my strict Catholic grandmother) and did not object or show disdain. I guess this goes to show they make up a wonderful family unit and they accept me for who I am regardless of what religion or irreligion I follow.

2. For all of you on the site.

A big shout out to anyone who tried to help me out. And even those who did not leave a response a shout out to you too. Life is tough and even if you are religious, no one has it easy, we're all human. All of you have your own personal stories and unfortunately, some had horrific upbringings and limitations in your childhood and it sucked some of your life away. I consider myself lucky that I never took religion too seriously that I didn't allow myself to get sucked into Catholicism. At 21, I am still very young and have plenty of time to explore new beliefs and if I so desire, to pick up a new religion if I like (I promise to be wary of "trickery and other jive beliefs in the future). And you never know, I may return to Christianity on my own accord but I highly doubt that.

3. Fate/God/Nature or whatever "guides" the universe.

I consider myself as a person who believes in some sort of life force but I prefer not to identify it as "God". In terms of what happens when I die, I don't really care right now. Maybe when I turn 65 or so I will think about it but I'm way too young to be thinking about it right now. I need to enjoy my time left at college and settle myself into a career.

4. My peers at school.

I talked to various teachers and fellow classmates at my Catholic college and there were some mixed opinions and testimonies. But my current RA was my favorite person to talk to about this. He is from Austria where religion/god talk is liberal and very few people take it seriously; not only Austria but throughout most of Europe. I had much fun talking to him about it and it sounds pretty awesome. Imagine that: a country (or even continent) where it is virtually safe to practice religion, not be "forced into it", and not have overzealous folks (like those awful Westboro Baptist Church members) preach their religion. Just an idea for now.

Anyways, one last time, a big shout out to anyone who tried to help me out. And even those who did not leave a response a shout out to you too. Life is tough and even if you are religious, no one has it easy, we're all human. Stuff is confusing and we all get into a funk sometimes. I just want to remind everyone to take it easy and enjoy life. As I write this, Valentine's Day is coming up, and I think everyone should try to do something fun with someone you love. I've never really pursued any relationships with females before, but there is one girl at my school I kind of like and I'm going to ask if she would to be my date for the night. Wish me luck, but please don't pray for me. I really believe if I want something badly enough, I need to mindful and strategic about it, not prayerful and blindly hopeful like I did in the past.

Peace out.

Manipulation in the name of "I have a word for you from God, and He demands obedience"

By Liz ~

I still feel a terrible grief within when I reflect back at how many times I have been manipulated in the name of God. I am fifty years of age now, and my life has been ruined through so-called do-gooders, who in the name of their so-called "God" robbing me of my potential to have a good career, the right partner, and the freedom and opportunity of becoming a successful singer in my twenties.

My first encounter with a Christian who screwed with my head was a girl at university. I was going out with a guy who was a Christian like myself at the time, and she had a supposed "Word from God" that it was not his will for me to go out with Phil, and that I should finish with him if I was to be obedient to God. She spent five hours talking about her gift of prophecy and the Book of Daniel in the Old Testament part of the Bible. I was heartbroken but felt compelled to finish with him. Likewise he was heartbroken when I did.

The next occasion was when I had been accepted to train to become a psychiatric nurse. A minister told me that he had heard from God after feeling alarm bells in his spirit and told me that God had informed him that I would be in danger if I went ahead. The fear that this instilled in me and my naive belief that he must be right caused me to abandon the training, though I was in constant mental torment that weekend trying to hear from God for myself, but the fear won over. I have never had a career and look back with deep regret at what a wonderful career it could have turned out to be.

This next one is the biggest whopper. The same minister about three years later after I had joined his fellowship prophesied that I should marry his brother. I had started going out with Alan, but the infatuation I felt for him quickly diminished after a few days of courting him. Words from God were followed. I married, got divorced, was guilt ridden, and was told I could not remarry. This caused me thirteen years of turmoil and stopped me doing anything constructive with my life. I met someone else and fell in love, but didn't believe that I could have sex or even marry him. Remarriage was forbidden even though my first marriage was a deception. Eventually after six years with Steve, and a few encouraging words, I came to the conclusion that under the circumstances that God would give me a second chance. On the morning of my wedding, my best friend turned up at my door telling me that I can't marry Steve as I was married to Alan previously and that the Bible says that I would be committing adultery and I would go to hell. All my previous fears returned and I was filled with anxiety. I still married Steve as I wouldn't let him down. We went on our honeymoon to the Algarve and my anxiety over the next two weeks increased. I drank away the pain and fear, but it came back the next day. I thought I was going to hell. It took a few years to come through this.

My first encounter with a Christian who screwed with my head was a girl at university. I was going out with a guy who was a Christian...I now look back and feel very robbed and hurt by Christians who took it upon themselves supposedly through "God's instruction" to do or not do the opposite to what I was feeling within. I would have had a great career with financial security now at the age of fifty. I would not have dreamed of marrying someone when I had such strong doubts that was causing me severe anxiety, only to be told that it was the devil attacking me and that I should stand in faith. How stupid was I.

I feel anger when I look at a Christian with their smug smiles and condescending looks. Not one non-christian has caused me any confusion and told me what to do.

I also doubted my faith when fellow Christians were telling me that they didn't think I was genuine and the same minister who deceived me said that he had a vision of me digging my spiritual grave.

I now have an open mind about religion and think a lot of it spoken of through the mouths of arrogant men are just talking through their pompous asses!

I hope that I can make amends to sort out my life and regain what the so called godly messages has taken away from me.

By the way, never believe someone who is attempting to manipulate you.

They almost pulled me in. Or, my life as a temporary Christian

By triedtobeone ~

I grew up in a non-Christian household, thank goodness. However, in my early school years (K-6), I was given the opportunity to go to private school. It happened to be Episcopal. Since no one on my mother's side of the family had a religious bone in their body, I can only assume I went there because it was a good school and no one thought it would do me any harm.

Every morning before class started the entire school would head to church for 45 minutes, with a Mass on Thursdays which included confession and communion, confirmations, etc. Then, off to classes and home at the end of the day. The church was beautiful -- stained glass windows and all of the bells and whistles one would expect to see. I don't ever remember us reading bible passages, although I am sure we must have. There were bibles in the pews.

Although my school mates would tease me, I could never bring myself to go to confession. Even at that early age I could not understand how if god knew all and saw all, why would I have to confess my sins? Really, how many sins can a 11-year-old have? I did not understand what sin was anyway, and I sure was not going to tell the Pastor who was also a teacher in the school that I lied or that I had a crush on a boy. God knew, why did he have to know too? After sixth grade I moved to public school, because it was less expensive. The only thing different was that I had received a better education so I was ahead of the rest of the 7-8th graders academically.

Occasionally I would be visiting relatives and would be dragged off to some church or another on Sundays -- Catholic, Baptist, Episcopal -- by people that otherwise never went to church or read bibles. Even before the age of 17 I always felt it was hypocritical to go to church on Easter or Christmas when all the rest of the year god was ignored.

I lived my life just the way I wanted. God was not in the picture; I never referred to god, never prayed, referred to nature's will rather than gods will, never really associated or spoke with folks that were bible-thumpers... There was no need to do so.

Fast forward to age 43.

I met a man who I fell in love with, and although he was not religious, he believed in god, read his bible daily, and searched for the truth. His bible was full of notes written in the margins and underlined in red. I still have it as it is the only piece of him I still have left. I wanted to know what he knew. He explained god to me so differently than anything I had ever heard and explained bible passages to me in a very clear way. I finally convinced him to take me to his church.

I was welcomed immediately, it took me a few months, but I finally found out that this was a Pentecostal based church. I loved hearing the messages the they taught, loved the excitement of the holy spirit touching everyone, and the fellowshipping with others. This was a small intimate church with no more than 20 people, it was 75 miles away, and I went twice a week for bible study and church for three years. I really got into studying the bible and letting the bible interpret it's own meaning. I was starting to believe in god. As time went on, I found out that we had sister churches in the area but due to disagreements in various doctrines, there was much separation between them all. This left me with an uneasy feeling. After all, if we are a church based on the biblical principals, then how could that happen? None the less I continued to go because I wanted to understand god and the great plan for mankind.

What I was taught the most was to "study to show yourself approved." The more I studied, the less I liked about everything and the more contradictions I could find. While our Pastor and another dear friend in the church were more than willing to answer every question I had, they were only able to answer them using bible verses and their own knowledge. I was always unsure and did not have the faith that those around me had answers (and I suspect that they knew that and never let on), but I understood what I read very well (or at least to their expectations). I tried hard to convert others to this message -- my family and friends -- only to be cut off from them. I was on my way to becoming a good Christian.

One day while studying/reading, I was discussing with my boyfriend my biblical education which my mentor in church was giving me. He was furious with me because I did not understand it the way he did, and he beat the crap out of me. I knew then that I would never be a good Christian (or a bad one, for that matter). Although the church members told it just was god answering my prayers, I know it was nature taking her course.

A few weeks later I told my mentor in church that because of all the "studying to show myself approved" I found that I no longer believed the bible was the true word of god. I have not heard from her or any members of the church since.

Damm, they almost got me hooked.

Indoctrinated?

By Bore Venal Charlatan ~

Is it possible to become so absorbed in an idea that it is impossible to be persuaded otherwise? At what point does a human mind become so fixed that it ceases to think independently? If so, is it ever possible to wake up?

For me the act of actually leaving the Christian faith was, compared to others’ experiences, relatively uneventful. I had always been far more logical than emotional; changing my beliefs internally was not much more complicated than changing their listing on Facebook. I had been mainly content with Christianity, but decided based on science and history that the religion was not absolute truth.

However, what I do feel strongly about is what I learned afterward, specifically from the responses I received from Christian friends. What I expected was a fun-filled theology debate, like the ones I have with deist and agnostic friends. But when I informed a church member of my reasons for leaving, I was surprised to see my de-conversion blamed entirely on acts of Satan!

Christian arguments are primarily fear based: lacking Biblical morality can lead to Nazism and Communism. Doubting the Bible means backsliding, and leads to god’s wrath. And of course, refusing to believe in the resurrection earns one eternal suffering – so why not be on the safe side and stop asking questions?

I pointed out that I simply could not believe any longer if I wanted to. I now ‘knew too much,’ and there was no going back. The Christian explanation for this? “The truth of Christianity weighs too much on your conscience and you are not willing to accept it…”

Whoa, I thought. After pages of explaining why logic had convinced me not to believe, I was now nothing more than a backslider? I knew it would be hard if not impossible to convince my friend to agree with any of my reasons for leaving, but – after pages of arguments, she would not even believe my reasoning was sincere?

I decided to respond the best way I knew how, and pointed out issues I had with Old Testament genocides, as well as Jehovah’s decision to allow Satan to torment Job. ‘Doesn’t it just seem wrong to love a god who obliterates anyone who doesn’t bow to him?’ I asked. ‘And what about Job? How can you worship a god who puts you through excruciating pain just to win a bet?’ I pointed out that the deist god would be a much better alternative – so why not at least take a look at a friendlier religion before choosing to worship an enslaver?

BOOM. My entire system of beliefs was reduced to an excuse to live outside of biblical law. Every scientific observation which did not affirm the ‘science’ in the book of Genesis – was in their view, nothing more than an attempt to evade what Christians believe is right. To them the only proper end in life is hopeless, eternal slavery to god, in the hopes that he will be merciful to his play-things. And they willingly accept this rather than dare to think otherwise. “I would rather be a slave to a god who created me,” was the Christian response. “A deist believes in the god of his own choosing – a god manufactured in his mind.” Can this be real? I asked myself. That someone is so utterly convinced they are correct they would rather try to justify the wrongs of their god, than think for a moment that there could be a better one?

“A deist relies on reason and empiricism,” I was told. “Problem is that human senses at best deceive us, and reason can be used to prove lies. Thus, the conclusions of a deist are dependent on his feelings and perceptions at the time. Deism is another name for moral relativism, or simply an excuse for one to do as he pleases.”

BOOM. My entire system of beliefs was reduced to an excuse to live outside of biblical law. Every scientific observation which did not affirm the ‘science’ in the book of Genesis – was in their view, nothing more than an attempt to evade what Christians believe is right. To them the only proper end in life is hopeless, eternal slavery to god, in the hopes that he will be merciful to his play-things. And they willingly accept this rather than dare to think otherwise.

I realized then and there the extent of Christian ‘Indoctrination.’ I use the term to refer to the concept in the Mass Effect series, of being mentally dominated by an oppressive, immensely powerful construct. What I learned made me wonder why myself, as well as others, have been able to escape this ‘Indoctrination.’ For one, some people are naturally free thinkers. But more importantly, within every human being is an inextinguishable, basic desire to be free. In many, this instinct is crushed, ignored, hidden, and all but wiped out completely, to the point that they love their servitude.

I cannot say with any certainty how many others will find a way out in the same way that I did. But somehow, somewhere, I decided I would rather shatter the blissful illusion of Christianity and see things for how they really were, and accept all the consequences that came with it. Like nearly every Christian, I spotted a hole in a web of lies; and like many, I could have continued believing blindly. I decided instead to pull at the nearest loose thread, to tug at it in the name of curiosity. But I was never the one to pull it apart; I only stood and watched, as my faith unraveled itself. Like Saul, scales fell from my eyes. The same fear of hell which ensures Christians stay good Christians, immediately lost all its power. I tugged aside the curtain, and saw that behind the face of the all-powerful Jehovah was only a scared little man.

I think I now understand why Adam and Eve’s choice was so sinful in the eyes of the tyrant Jehovah. They made the only choice a human being can make. They chose knowledge over ignorance. And that has made all the difference.

I wish I could let this go...

By I_love_Dog ~

I have never posted on this site, but I have been a fan for over 5 years... since I lost my faith. I know that the bible is not true, and I do not believe in a god.

Recently I have been terribly depressed and have been questioning why this was done to me:

• Why would someone teach a child they are worthless without god?

• Why would a loving parent instill fear in a child of everything and fear of a eternal place of punishment, not even thinking of it critically?

Sorry for the rant... I just don't understand why I am to respect these beliefs when they have literally ruined my life.

Are people really that happy knowing most of the world will burn in hell? They say it helps people...

I will never understand this way of thinking. I never had any self confidence and wonder if I am ruined. Did anyone ever really love me? I constantly try to rationalize their way of thinking as if it would ever make sense to me.

Where do I go from here? I am constantly hurt every time I see a post saying "dedicated our son to god today." What is going on with people? I wonder if I will ever get over this.

You people on here have helped me so much. I just think sometimes I am beyond help. Thank you for all your posts and everything you have done to help others like me.

Hope this made some sense as I have literally been crippled with mind fog and depression.

Curse Your Branches?

 By Ken Hood Jr. ~

One of the things that I've had to deal with since losing my faith is my attitude towards both my "past life" (I can't draw too much of a sharp line here) and my Christian upbringing.

Past Life

How should I feel about the fact that I once taught people to believe what I now reject? I am not bragging here, just stating the facts. I was no "pew filler" or "Sunday Christian." I bought into the message wholeheartedly. I told others that the most important thing they could do in life was to get right with God and that failure to do so would earn his eternal wrath. I remember having a long conversation with my agnostic roommate. We walked down across the West Bank of the University of Minnesota as I tried to convince him that life without an afterlife was purposeless and void. "Why not just go crazy?" I really believed it. My pastor at the time, Steve Treichler, used to say that if you believed that this was the only life then you shouldn't be wasting your time in church, you should be out in the world, "sinning like crazy!" I had internalized this mindset and I simply could not see how others could choose to live their lives without concrete knowledge (or at least the feeling of concrete knowledge) of what comes next. There are days when I want to curse myself for what a fool I was. How blind could I be? I told one of my professors--a man who knows far more than I do about the Hebrew Bible--that what he was doing was "causing harm to God's Kingdom." The man was a Christian and yet because his Christianity was more flexible and less threatened by "secular history" I felt offended by his worldview and took it upon myself to correct him. I could go on and list more examples if I wanted.

It feels so good to be right though, doesn't it?

There's another song that relates to this feeling I now have about my past life as a would-be evangelist/teacher/missionary/apologist. The song-writer is speaking from his heart as a former believer and Christian band leader. The opening lyrics go like this:

We filled a book with what Jesus said, so we could all disagree on what he meant to say.
Do you know better than me?
Well, if there's a chance the divine exists,
I hope it can cure my soul of all of my sins,
and all the things I did
when I believed the myth.

I've thought a lot about those words in the past few months. The reality is that the past is the past. I can't go back and right all of my wrongs. I can't change who I was back then. The best that I can do is to acknowledge it, try to learn from it, and move on.

My Branches

There's another side to this coin. How do I deal with my feelings of resentment and bitterness about how I was raised? How do I move on and learn to accept the things that I didn't have any control over? I could just sweep it under the rug. Pretend that it never happened, or that it didn't really affect me. I could re-write my history to be more sanitary and saccharine. I could pretend that I would have made the same choices regardless of my childhood experiences. But, I know that would be a lie. On the other hand, I need to find peace with my religious upbringing. There was a lot of good in it. One of the good things it taught me was the importance of forgiveness and reconciliation. I could close my heart off to others, I could burn down the bridges to my believing siblings and my parents. I could be angry that they don't understand me. I could be angry that I was taught things which I now recognize to be false and distorted views of reality. Or, I can acknowledge the past, be open about my experiences and learn to move on. Forgive, but not forget. There are lessons to be learned from back there, both positive and negative. I learned the power of fear and the terror of an overwhelming, omnipresent God. But, I also learned the importance of having principles, of showing love for others even when it was hard. I learned the importance of community in the growth of a family. I can't throw it all out so I will forgive and I will move on. I will mend the bridges that I can and I will strive to keep my own tongue in check (I think there's a few Bible verses on that ;) ).




Website: http://kch.me