One Year Into Recovery – A Reflection

By AnonAgno94 ~

It's hard to believe - we are coming up now on one year of me departing from the born-again Christian community. And while I am not the best at maintaining an active online blogger lifestyle (apologies for not posting more regularly on here), I thought it would be appropriate to share some thoughts as to where I am now.

I came to this community here at Ex-C as a new agnostic, struggling with losing the foundation that once had the name “Jesus Christ” appended to it. Over the last few months, however, and after lengthy conversations with others with whom I have crossed paths, I will declare today that I now consider myself an atheist rather than an agnostic. Am I definite on that? No, but quite honestly with all of the knowledge I have gained over this last year on humanity and life as we know it, I cannot help but truly doubt there will be anything once my brain decides it has lived its life and needs a more permanent rest. Not relying upon some one-in-a-million afterlife can be a good way to live, I am slowly learning. It amplifies the appreciation I have for each breath that I take, for each day that I arrive home from work and can embrace my boyfriend, for each memory he and I can create and each plan we can take.

Though I am not out of the clearing yet, and quite honestly, I am not sure I ever will be, but with each passing day I grow steps and steps further from the mental abuse of conservative religion and closer towards the person I truly want to be – free, independent, and fully appreciative of what it means to be 'human.'

But I still break down sometimes. I still cannot bear the thought of being alone (my boyfriend wants to get me a dog to help me cope when he is gone on some weekends). Sometimes the thought of one day dying and never coming back completely terrifies me to where I wish, I wish that the god I had been raised to believe in, to trust in, in some good, loving form, actually existed so I could go back to believing that death would never touch me, that Christ would be my victory.

Apart from the judgmental, higher-than-thou mindset that Christianity teaches you, I at times envy the assurance so many devout believers have in the afterlife, the belief that I used to have so close to my heart.

But then I am reminded of Christianity's plague upon our nation; the influence it has over our society, over our political system (which is quite surprising honestly considering the historicity surrounding the founding of our country). Christians pride themselves on proselytizing to broken individuals, to those who are downtrodden, emotionally weak, vulnerable, and afaraid. It is when you are desperate that you truly reach out for something, anything. It is also when a figure, such as a “loving Jesus,” can weave his way into your belief system, to make you think that he is the everlasting friend, that he would do everything and anything for you, and, in fact, he already has.

I hope one day that we as humanity can alone be the true support for each other, not some false, mythical belief system. But I think we still have a long way to go before religion is truly but a memory of our species' existence, if ever. While it may not be in my lifetime, I can at least work to continue to connect with those (such as many of you who are probably reading this now) to encourage and support and remind that you are not alone and that you do not need some mythical being to tell you so but rather a physical, fellow human being. That you are not alone.

That I am not alone.

Comments

Are You an Atheist Success Story?

By Avangelism Project ~ F acts don’t spread. Stories do. It’s how (good) marketing works, it’s how elections (unfortunately) are won and lost, and it’s how (all) religion spreads. Proselytization isn’t accomplished with better arguments. It’s accomplished with better stories and it’s time we atheists catch up. It’s not like atheists don’t love a good story. Head over to the atheist reddit and take a look if you don’t believe me. We’re all over stories painting religion in a bad light. Nothing wrong with that, but we ignore the value of a story or a testimonial when we’re dealing with Christians. We can’t be so proud to argue the semantics of whether atheism is a belief or deconversion is actually proselytization. When we become more interested in defining our terms than in affecting people, we’ve relegated ourselves to irrelevance preferring to be smug in our minority, but semantically correct, nonbelief. Results Determine Reality The thing is when we opt to bury our

Christian TV presenter reads out Star Wars plot as story of salvation

An email prankster tricked the host of a Christian TV show into reading out the plots of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Star Wars in the belief they were stories of personal salvation. The unsuspecting host read out most of the opening rap to The Fresh Prince, a 1990s US sitcom starring Will Smith , apparently unaware that it was not a genuine testimony of faith. The prankster had slightly adapted the lyrics but the references to a misspent youth playing basketball in West Philadelphia would have been instantly familiar to most viewers. The lines read out by the DJ included: "One day a couple of guys who were up to no good starting making trouble in my living area. I ended up getting into a fight, which terrified my mother." The presenter on Genesis TV , a British Christian channel, eventually realised that he was being pranked and cut the story short – only to move on to another spoof email based on the plot of the Star Wars films. It began: &quo

So Just How Dumb Were Jesus’ Disciples? The Resurrection, Part VII.

By Robert Conner ~ T he first mention of Jesus’ resurrection comes from a letter written by Paul of Tarsus. Paul appears to have had no interest whatsoever in the “historical” Jesus: “even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, we know him so no longer.” ( 2 Corinthians 5:16 ) Paul’s surviving letters never once mention any of Jesus’ many exorcisms and healings, the raising of Lazarus, or Jesus’ virgin birth, and barely allude to Jesus’ teaching. For Paul, Jesus only gets interesting after he’s dead, but even here Paul’s attention to detail is sketchy at best. For instance, Paul says Jesus “was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” ( 1 Corinthians 15:4 ), but there are no scriptures that foretell the Jewish Messiah would at long last appear only to die at the hands of Gentiles, much less that the Messiah would then be raised from the dead after three days. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus—an event Paul never mentions in his lette

Morality is not a Good Argument for Christianity

By austinrohm ~ I wrote this article as I was deconverting in my own head: I never talked with anyone about it, but it was a letter I wrote as if I was writing to all the Christians in my life who constantly brought up how morality was the best argument for Christianity. No Christian has read this so far, but it is written from the point of view of a frustrated closeted atheist whose only outlet was organizing his thoughts on the keyboard. A common phrase used with non-Christians is: “Well without God, there isn’t a foundation of morality. If God is not real, then you could go around killing and raping.” There are a few things which must be addressed. 1. Show me objective morality. Define it and show me an example. Different Christians have different moral standards depending on how they interpret the Bible. Often times, they will just find what they believe, then go back into scripture and find a way to validate it. Conversely, many feel a particular action is not

ACTS OF GOD

By David Andrew Dugle ~ S ettle down now children, here's the story from the Book of David called The Parable of the Bent Cross. In the land Southeast of Eden – Eden, Minnesota that is – between two rivers called the Big Miami and the Little Miami, in the name of Saint Gertrude there was once built a church. Here next to it was also built a fine parochial school. The congregation thrived and after a multitude of years, a new, bigger church was erected, well made with clean straight lines and a high steeple topped with a tall, thin cross of gold. The faithful felt proud, but now very low was their money. Their Sunday offerings and school fees did not suffice. Anon, they decided to raise money in an unclean way. One fine summer day the faithful erected tents in the chariot lot between the two buildings. In the tents they set up all manner of games – ring toss, bingo, little mechanical racing horses and roulette wheels – then all who lived in the land between the two rivers we

I can fix ignorance; I can't fix stupid!

By Bob O ~ I 'm an atheist and a 52-year veteran of public education. I need not tell anyone the problems associated with having to "duck" the "Which church do you belong to?" with my students and their parents. Once told by a parent that they would rather have a queer for their sons' teacher than an atheist! Spent HOURS going to the restroom right when prayers were performed: before assemblies, sports banquets, "Christmas Programs", awards assemblies, etc... Told everyone that I had a bladder problem. And "yes" it was a copout to many of you, but the old adage (yes, it's religious) accept what you can't change, change that which you can and accept the strength to know the difference! No need arguing that which you will never change. Enough of that. What I'd like to impart is my simple family chemistry. My wife is a Baptist - raised in a Baptist Orphanage (whole stories there) and is a believer. She did not know my religi

Search This Blog