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So What Made You First Start To Doubt?

As weird as it is, I think it was the attitude of my former "fellow" Christians that started me on the road to doubt. Even though I've got a bachelors in Physics and have generally held a belief in evolution and big bang cosmology for most of the believing stage of my life, it really wasn't science that brought up questions(cognitive dissonance at its best). I think I've always generally never had a connection with anyone in any church I had ever attended. Mainly since most Christians, especially in the south, are non-intellectuals. But I think it really started when I began listening to extreme metal. I couldn't understand how anyone could look down on something that I loved so much and felt so natural to listen to. I can't tell you how many people have told me that its "the devils music"(even though most of the lyrics are socio-political).

Of course later on I did my research and discovered how ridiculous my former beliefs were. So who or what started you on your path to disbelief?

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Permalink Reply by Angie Jackson on September 15, 2009 at 9:15am

Have you heard of Scrupulosity? It's a form of OCD that centers on religious rituals, beliefs, and obsessions. Not fun.

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Permalink Reply by Angie Jackson on September 15, 2009 at 9:58am

I was raised to be a future cult leader. I think everyone's religious indoctrination experience is different. Even in the same family, my siblings weren't affected the same way I was. (One's an indifferent atheist scientist, the other a fundamentalist christian homemaker and small business owner.) I'm writing a book and blog about my journey, and hoping it helps other people getting out of cults or extreme religious belief.

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Permalink Reply by Dre Smith on September 15, 2009 at 10:19am

Not sure I can narrow it down to one specific event. I think it was more of a culmination of different things. My household wasn't overtly religious, hell I don't even really remember going to church alot before the age of about 10 to be honest. My dad worked weekends, and my mom didn't do anything. When she started getting sick she seemed to go to church more, but she had always been sick with lupus since she was a teenager. Anyhow the people at the church convinced her to stop taking her medication and just "trust in the lord" and it got her killed ultimately 7 years later. It lead her to be in the hospital in the first place initially and was downhill ever since.

Now mind you my mother was very physically abusive towards me. So this certainly did not help the god angle. And as I got older, I became more inclined into the philosophical arguments that would come later. For a long time I just simply knew I was not a Christian and that was all. For a while I did search for some kind of spirituality learned about Judaism, Islam, Shinto, Buddhism, and Hindu. And they all left me with a feeling that something was not quite right. For a long long time I thought something was wrong because I found myself incapable of belief.

Till I found atheism all the answers started to make sense and I started reading more about 2 years ago. And it was very painful, still is talking about this around famil. And they don't accept it and they are still trying to nudge me to become a Christian but I know that is not going to happen anytime soon, I just wish they would stop and leave me the hell alone about this.

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Permalink Reply by Angie Jackson on September 15, 2009 at 7:25pm

Sorry your mom fell prey to "faith healing" but glad you're not being abused these days.

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Permalink Reply by Tak G. on September 15, 2009 at 10:06pm

I remember the first time I read the bible and asking mom and dad after reading the tower of babel, "god was worried that people would build a skyscraper to heaven?"

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Permalink Reply by Sonny Mobley on September 17, 2009 at 11:39am

Yes! I feel you. I remember being quite perplexed as a child kneeling down reading this out of my dads insanely huge family bible.

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Permalink Reply by Crazy Cat Lady on September 16, 2009 at 8:40pm

Studying history, just a passing glance and the atrocities done in the name of religion are endless, also learning about other religions and the evolution of religious doctrine.

Know them all...Believe in none.

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Permalink Reply by JFK on September 17, 2009 at 12:10am

I never really believed that everything in the bible was true, and we never really went to church. I was raised non-denominational christian, but my mom was against every sect of christianity saying that they were the one true way and everyone else was going to burn in hell. Added to that I'm pretty sure my dad is a closeted nontheist.

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Permalink Reply by Angie Jackson on September 17, 2009 at 10:14am

Ha, my parents thought every denomination was wrong, but that WE were the special chosen ones. So close to normal, and yet sooooo far.

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Permalink Reply by Sonny Mobley on September 17, 2009 at 11:38am

I'm not really sure to be completely honest. I remember praying a lot when I was a kid for various things that never happened. That was probably it. Quite sure I was skeptical even before then, but not in any noticeable way. It took me years to reach true atheism. I was agnostic and searching for god for most of my life. If nothing else I believed in belief and was so scared of death (eventual non-existence) I attempted to find proof of some sort of an afterlife. Philosophy (Camus and Nietzsche had the most influence) coupled with my already existing love for science really put the final nails in my belief in belief. Religion is at its core pessimistic.

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Permalink Reply by Humanist Mark on September 23, 2009 at 3:57pm

My story is a bit different from all of yours. I was actually on a path of integrating Judaism, and Buddhism. I sought out books to make sure that Buddhism didn't create some kind of a conflict and during this journey questions arose with my own personal psyche. I started to question the Old Testament when I was learning Hebrew. Oh, and when I started reciting a prayer in Hebrew that thanks God for slaying the babies of our enemies that hit the nail on the proverbial head. I knew that a truly loving God would not kill or destroy. He would not ask us to slaughter out own unborn children.

After this I began a search and was led to a movie by Brian Flemming. While geared toward Christians it forced me to question the Original Testament even more. Ten books later and a few podcasts, including one by Stephen Uhl, who was a former Catholic Priest eventually led me to Sherwin T. Wine, who created Humanistic Judaism last century. Humanistic Judaism was created for those Jews who had no belief in God but want to retain a link to the cultural and historical part of Judaism which is important to all Jews.

Anyway, I hope my reply wasn't too long or boring for all of you. If one other Jewish person can be helped by my story so be it.

Oh, and the link to The God Who Wasn't There can be found here.

http://www.thegodmovie.com/

Peace,

Mark

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Permalink Reply by deepthought42 on September 24, 2009 at 10:39pm

Ok, this may sound funny, but when I was a kid I figured no one believed in god anymore because we had been to outer space and there is no heaven there. *lol* Boy was I wrong! I went through a period of "belief" (I believed but felt uncomfortable regarding religion). It wasn't until a few years ago in undergrad that I realized I was agnostic, and then I finally admitted to myself that I am an atheist. Ah, it feels good to say that.