By John Shores ~ I n the Christian vernacular, "sin" carries currency of some sort. "The wages of sin" is one phrase that supports this notion. The idea that "Jesus died to save you from the consequences of your sin" also sounds rather like a rich uncle bailing out a nephew who is deeply in debt. What makes this currency of sin somewhat nefarious is that in the Christian worldview sin is not in fact the same thing as behaving immorally . In Matthew 5 , Jesus states that things such as anger and lust are up for "sin" status and can land one at the judgment seat. This idea of elevating thoughts and natural impulses to the status of "sins" really crosses any lines of reasonableness. Born in sin? Christian doctrine is founded on the idea that humans have a "sin nature." What does that mean? If you read Romans 7 ("…For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want....")...

By freeatlast ~ A t the family reunion, we sit in the meeting room at the Comfort Inn in a small Arkansas town, about twenty-five of us in a circle. Encouraging everyone to share a scripture, prayer, or song as the spirit leads, an earnest brother adds that our family worship will culminate with the Lord’s Supper, which sits on a table in the middle of the circle, cups of grape juice carefully poured into Dixie cups and two paper plates of homemade communion bread, unleavened of course. He adds that in order for everyone to be heard, he has turned up the thermostat in the room, so the air conditioner noise won’t interfere, a terrible idea I think because the air in this room is thick and warm, and we haven’t even started. Of course the whole idea of family church was a terrible one to me, though, one I knew would be the “highlight” of our time together as it is a tradition of my husband’s very Southern, very religious extended family. Living 800 miles away, my husband and I hav...

By freeatlast ~ T he giraffes look happy enough As the pair of them, actually repeating pairs of them Look down at my baby in the glow of the Bible nightlight The repeating elephants too, out for a cruise on the arks that float on the border up by the ceiling Noah presides, lots of Noahs, grinning captains: Those 40 days and nights went fast! Now we are just taking in the sights, Though it’s all water at this point, at least the sun is out. Of course it is, up there anyway. How carefully I stood on the stepladder, working my way around the room and smoothing out the bubbles, making sure everything stuck Perfection was all I wanted For my baby to feel safe in her room, To be safe as the arks filled with chuckling zebras, lions, and cheetahs sailed around her in the sapphire blue water, But here in the night the water darkens Churning, heaving And I wonder about the babies Only 8, remember? Only 8 allowed. What about the babies? The others? What abou...

By American Apostate ~ I n an online community such as Ex-C, an article like this one is necessary, in my opinion. I believe the webmaster published Mr. JRSD's article to invite good, constructive discussion about our beliefs or lack thereof. I felt it was an invitation for us to write up our rebuttals, as I am sure that when many of us came out to our friends and families, we received lectures just like Mr. JRSD's " You Make the Choice ." Let's begin. First off, Mr. JRSD, I don't know where you go to church either, nor do I care to, but just because you have never heard a preacher stand in the pulpit and tell his congregation not to question his teaching, doesn't mean that it's not an unspoken rule. In my experience, I have had many preachers tell us to read the scriptures for ourselves. Question everything. Seek a deeper understanding of scripture. That is just what I did. That's what many of us ex- Christians had done before our deconvers...

By John Shores ~ T alking to a Christian about the character of God is always tiresome. What troubles me the most is how quickly so many dismiss anything in the Old Testament as being irrelevant. It is as if they think "that was God before he went through rehab, but now he's really a nice guy." To me, this is like watching a video of Hitler playing with a puppy and thinking, "Aw, how sweet!" If one was to do a profile of this god, what sort of person would we be looking at? The Old Testament god is just too easy a target. So let's see what this new and improved god of the New Testament is like. A Kinder, Gentler God… Let's begin with the Book of the Acts of the Apostles . In chapter five we find an account that never fails to astonish me. The scene: A congregational meeting The sermon: "Jesus died for your sins. Repent therefore!" In the midst of this "Repent therefore" sermon, Peter is working himself into frenzy. ...

By WizenedSage (Galen Rose) ~ T he US Supreme Court ’s rulings in the Hobby Lobby and Greece, NY cases were clearly setbacks for seculars, but the general trend of American social attitudes is clearly in the secular direction, away from the clutches of organized religion. The rapid increase of the “nones,” (now 23%) and especially the dramatic rise of women “nones,” (now 43% of the "nones") provide ample evidence of this trend. But now there’s more. There was a terrific article on the Gallup site on May 26th, 2015 . The headline read: “Americans Continue to Shift Left on Key Moral Issues.” The story concerned a 2015 poll of American adults’ attitudes on 16 moral issues. In this telephone survey , the interviewers asked: “Next, I’m going to read you a list of issues. Regardless of whether or not you think it should be legal, for each one, please tell me whether you personally believe that in general it is morally acceptable or morally wrong . How about – [RA...

By American Apostate ~ I used to have to robotically recite this mantra every Sunday for years. It wasn't until just before my deconversion that I'd really, REALLY thought about it. Was God good, ALL THE TIME? All one really had to do was open up his bible and read a couple pages to really doubt the veracity of this mindless mantra. What am I babbling on about, the Christian asks? The Atheists know where I'm going. Original sin. That's right. If Yahweh is oh so loving and such a good and perfect father, than explain this shit to me. Let me just give you a little analogy, so you can see what I see when I read this story: First off, I am a mom of 3 and a pharmacy student. I like to think of myself as a good mom. But as I read the story of original sin without the rose colored glasses of religion, I began to wonder. What if I had Yahweh's personality and this story played out like this..... Say we fast forward a couple years and I have my Doctorate and I sta...

By Ben Love ~ T his morning a man knocked on my front door and invited me to his church. He had with him a Bible and a bag full of pamphlets on his particular church home. I declined the pamphlet and the invitation, but I did invite him into my home for a chat. While he was much more pleasant than some of the evangelists I’ve come across, his rhetoric was pretty much par for the course. What you would expect, basically. However, he did say one thing in particular that, to me, just begged for an article to be written. So here I am, writing it. What did he say? This:  “I understand your intellectual objections, but the plain fact is that the benefits of being a Christian simply outweigh any objection you could possibly raise.” I merely smiled, deciding whether or not to contest the statement. I was actually about to, but then he suddenly said he had to leave. As I closed the door behind him, I thought to myself,  “Hmmm, perhaps I should write an article addressing wha...

By Carl S. ~ T here's a special dispensation from liability reserved for clergy. It goes by the name, "He's only human." It explains why a pastor, who has been in one or more adulterous relationships (while preaching, at the same time, virtue and honesty to his congregation), is forgiven: he's only a human sinner. Somewhere behind this is the empathy of, "If I was in his position with his power, I might do the same." Christians used to have a saying, "Not perfect, but forgiven." Maybe it's because people didn't know how to interpret what it meant that led to its demise. Nobody's perfect, so what's the point, and doesn't being forgiven make you superior to the rest of us unforgiven ones? Doesn't forgiveness give you free reign to be "not perfect" in the future? This may be one more example of us vs. them, or rather, we vs. you. Being not perfect is, I'm guessing, supposed to be an admission of humili...

By WidePathGirl ~ M y infertility journey began two years after giving birth to my first child. When I got pregnant with my oldest daughter my husband and I thought we must be super fertile, she was conceived after only one month of trying! We were sure we'd have our dreamed of 2 children before I was 35 right on time, as planned. Boy did we get that wrong! Unbeknownst to us, I was actually born with what is called a "septic uterus". This is a deformity where your normally pear shaped uterus is instead shaped like a heart, with the top sort of bending or sagging down and covered with a thick ridge of tissue that no embryo can successfully implant into. Getting pregnant right off the bat like that was a lucky one off thing. She just happened to find the one spot inside my uterus that would work. Fast forward a few years, two devastating miscarriages later we still didn't know what was wrong. We had no idea why it wasn't working this time and I fel...

By Ben Love ~ D id you become an atheist because you're pissed off at God? No, I became an atheist because I felt it was intellectually the only choice I could make that allowed me to look in the mirror without feeling like a hypocrite. I became an atheist because I truly feel the evidence can lead only to that conclusion. Anyway, did you become a Christian because you're pissed off at logic and reason? Is there anything that could bring you back to Christianity? No, nothing. Who willingly goes back to prison? Aren't you worried you'll go to hell? Nope. Hell disappears when your belief in God disappears. Besides, fear is a terrible motivator. I'm not saying it isn't effective; it is. But I'm not interested in any fear-based motivations.  Do you believe in the afterlife?  Not really. There might be some kind of afterlife, but I doubt it. Either way, I'm much more interested in the  before  death than the  after life.  ...