How A Christian Lost His Faith
I thought it only appropriate for my first TA blog to be a story of how I lost my faith. Let it be a lesson on how to reason with the unreasonable. First a little background on where I came from.
I was raised in a Christian fundamentalist home. My uncle is a Petroleum Engineer which he thinks qualifies him in the area of Geology as well. I was raised to believe the Earth is 6,000 years old and God created the Heavens and Earth in 6 literal days. I believed this well into my 20s. I only lost my faith ~2 years ago and I am now 29 years old. I am partly embarrassed to admit that but I only learned about Evolution from people who were apposed to Evolution. Something I never would have done with the Bible but with Evolution it made sense at the time.
I was so immersed into this dogma and delusion that I actually decided I wanted to be a part of it. I was going to start blogging on Creation and stumping the top Evolution myths. I also decided that once I had built a large base on evolution blogs I would turn it into a book. I first needed to learn the top arguments for Evolution. I looked through AiG and ICR.org and finally made the greatest decision of my life. I wanted to hear it directly from the horses mouth. So I Google'd it!
What really got me was a link to a documentary that covered Biogeography. Specifically, the evolution of Marsupials. It was brilliant. Discovery was made in South America of early Marsupials which only exist in Australia. A prediction was made that fossils would one day be found in Antarctica of all places. Then 10 years later, a treasure troll of Marsupial fossils were found in Antarctica. This obviously did not fit with the Global Flood model! It was just enough to spark my interest. I started with the obvious questions. How did the Eye evolve? What about the heart? Or the ears or nose? Everything made sense. It suddenly dawned on me that I was only learning about Evolution from people who were admittedly apposed to it. After that, I read Richard Dawkins "The God Delusion" and I could no longer believe in the Supernatural.
Science softened me up and logic killed every bit of faith I had left. I have since then researched the answers to many of the arguments from a Creation side and found them all to be false or blatant lies. I can no longer stand my children being indoctrinated into religion and see it as a form of child abuse. I now see the problems caused by religion and cringe any time I hear a politician talk about God or Jesus. I cannot hear religion discussed without fighting back the chuckles. I do not have a problem with the liberal Christians. The ones that believe Jesus died for their sins but think the rest is just the ranting of a book. To them I wish the best and I hope you make it to Heaven. For the rest however, I think they are damaging my country. I believe they are raising their children into a hateful religion built to spread like a virus.
To the fundamentalists I ask:
• Would you learn about the bible from an Atheist? Then why learn about Evolution from a Creationist?
• Why was God so involved in a time of desert nomads who still believed the Earth was flat and disappear when we had real questions to ask?
• If God can heal the sick, why can't he grow back limbs as well? Is this beyond God's power?
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Comment by Scarlette Blues on July 6, 2011 at 11:35am -
Thanks for sharing your story and it's very similar to mine! I also wanted to be one of those Christians with "the answers". Look where knowledge has took us!
Have you shared your experiences with your immediate family? I ask because sometimes the fundie reactions can be quite a shocking experience.
Good luck & never stop learning!
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Comment by Moral Atheist on July 6, 2011 at 11:51am -
Yes I have. I get mail from family along the lines of find Jesus or go to hell. My response is always "I do not negotiate with terrorists". I really want to come up with my own religion to preach to them. Maybe steal the celestial tea pot idea. Tell them they need to accept the tea pot as their savior or they will spend eternity in boiling water?? Maybe when I have time one day.
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Comment by Scarlette Blues on July 6, 2011 at 11:59am
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LOL, creating a religion can be easy just look at L. Ron Hubbard! I've been working on a way to work evolution into the Bible. It's turning out to be harder than expected!
I just recently "came out" to 1/2 of my family. It included an 8 hour debate! I can only imagine how the other side will react (they are fundamentalists).
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Comment by Craig Nomazlab on July 6, 2011 at 12:11pm -
Congradulations on opening your mind, and welcome to Think Atheist!
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Comment by Moral Atheist on July 6, 2011 at 12:13pm
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If you want to incorporate Evolution into the Bible, a christian named Hugh Ross has already done it for you. The difference being he says that God replaced the species that went extinct with other newer species. Used other Homo sapien species as a way to prepare the world for our hunting abilities etc... with a little different wording, he has already done it all for you.
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Comment by Travis D on July 6, 2011 at 3:14pm -
Im sure most of you have seen this but Penn tells it the best. The best way to turn someone into an Atheist is to give them a bible. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E3rGev6OZ3w
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Comment by Ben on July 6, 2011 at 7:58pm -
My experience moving to Atheism has many similar traits to it as yours. Mostly the part where I actually start thinking, "What was I believing??"
It's no wonder religious people try to keep science, logic, and reason away from children.
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