I can relate to the idea of feeling like something is wrong. Religious leaders like to use that to keep
people under control, don’t they? I
hadn’t really thought of a period of de-programming after leaving Christianity, but
after I had made the choice to be atheist I did read a couple books by
prominent atheists which was a kind of de-programming. They are fairly militant in their whole idea,
but I can understand why. That being
said, I don’t agree with everything they write or say, but I now realize that
that is okay. I can think for
myself! I do agree with much and so I
recommend them as a way to get a basic idea of where I am. The first book, if you’re interested, is The
God Delusion, by Richard Dawkins. The other
is God Is Not Good, by Christopher Hitchens.
I don't mind telling you how I got here. Strangely enough, it started with my studying
the Bible very minutely. The more I
looked at certain things in there in connection to what I was seeing in the
world around me, the more I questioned.
It is also strange that a very staunch Calvinist—Calvin himself—started
me on this path. In his theological
work, he says to read the scripture for one’s self.[1] So, I did.
I could go on about this, but some of the main things were also
fundamental things.
For example, my first eye-opener was with Adam and Eve. God is supposed to be omnipotent, omnipresent
and omniscient, right? Well, if he was
all-knowing, then he would have known that Adam and Eve were going to eat the
fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. My question is why did he go ahead and put
the tree in the garden? OK. He wanted to test them. Why?
He already knew they were going to eat the fruit. What's to test? Then, after the Fall, why did it take so long
for a savior to arrive? I mean this is
the creator and master of the universe, right?
Why did it take so many thousands of years to get the redeemer in
place? OK. Because of sin. Well, if that's the case, then even God
almighty is weak before sin and takes a couple of thousand years to fix what it
took only seven days to create, and a few minutes to screw up. Hmmm…
Also, I'm sorry, but a god that knows that his creation is going to
screw up and then freely gives them the opportunity in their complete and total
innocence and ignorance to do so, is not a very nice god. And, if all people born are born into sin
because of what Adam and Eve did, where is the justice in that? Why am I sent to burn for eternity in Hell
because of something I had absolutely no control over? That is not just. That is evil and tyrannical! So, if this god is not just, then he is a
liar, because he claims to be just.
Punishing people who do not deserve it, merely because they were born is
also not love, it is hatred, pure unadulterated hatred.
Sorry, that's just the first couple of verses of the first
book and that is mostly my emotional response!
I became agnostic for a time, because I thought about humans trying to
prove a deity's existence. It cannot be
done. But, it also cannot be proven that
a deity does not exist. So, I went on in that way for awhile. Then, after feeling like I was wasting my
time even thinking about it, I just kind of woke up and realized that I believe
that there is no god. This is, of
course, different than most peoples' definition of atheism, which states that “an
atheist does not believe in God.” And,
it is not simply semantics. The typical
definition begins with the idea that there is a god in which to believe. True atheism believes there is NO god and so
nothing to believe in.
I'm not a closet atheist, but usually don't just go around
telling people that I am unless they bring it up or ask me a question regarding
my “faith.” I guess I want to avoid being
responsible for their giving up faith, if that happens. Not that I am particularly persuasive about
it. I actually don't even think that
much about it unless someone asks, and then I can go on and on about it as you
can see from this post. It's not that I
even want to go on about it, it just happens because there is like a valve and
the question opens it. This post is me
trying to restrain myself from being wordy, and I'm not sure it's working all
that well...
There is a lot of Judeo-Christian “stuff,” as well as other
mythology, in literature, but it was several years before I was comfortable
enough to use what I had learned in writing and thinking about literary
texts. I even avoided certain literature
that seemed particularly Christian because I would get angry about the things I
had been through. I then began to
realize that most of the literature is just interpretation, like those asserted
by all the thousands of Christian sects or denominations out there. Everyone has their own interpretation and so
there is NO single right interpretation, even though thousands of people have
killed and been killed for what they believed was the only single
interpretation. What a confusing
mess. Anyway, I’m going to shut up for
now.
I figured it's all just a test on how we handle life and that's it. We guard and love each other, and look only for the best for others. I see that "The Maker" if you could even give a name. That programmed all things into existence. He created "good" and "evil" as it says in the "Bible". To be narrow minded and say you know all just because you don't know is ignorance. Just because you cannot see something doesn't mean it doesn't exist. Did you know that our universe swirls and goes throughout space at a tremendous speed. Everything is connected from every atom in interaction to plan of existence. I guess to me each to his own. You can only form your opinions based on your own experience.
ReplyDeleteConsciousness comes at a price. To be aware of your existence and to be aware of your actions and how it effects others in mind. Cheers!