[Editor’s Note: “Your Skeptic Stories” is an ongoing series written by readers like you, people who have, through one means or another, discovered skepticism and critical thinking. These stories remind us that we all started somewhere and some of us are still finding our way as skeptics If you are interested in contributing your own story, please submit your piece of around 1000 words to maria (at) randi.org along with a short 2-3 line bio.
Today’s story comes from Lauren]
I grew up a “CAPE” catholic, meaning my family would really only go to church on Christmas, Ash Wednesday, Palm Sunday, and Easter. I went to CCD (weekly catholic indoctrination sessions for kids) and my parents, though not avid church goers, strongly believed in the “power of prayer”, encouraging praying the rosary and whatnot for help. At 12, I started to struggle with the idea of God. I had a debate with my CCD teacher about condoms, feeling strongly that those who don’t want kids shouldn’t have them, because it only leads to child abuse and neglect of which I had quite a few friends who had fallen victim. This led me to start questioning the teachings of the church. I postulated, “What if we just die and that’s it? Our body is buried and we’re no longer in existence.” The thought scared the hell out of me, so I put my critical thinking cap away and continued to blindly follow, with the hope of something. Now the idea of heaven, never really made much sense to me and neither did the idea of creation. What are we, God’s Barbie dolls? Plain and simple, I just didn’t want to die and be gone; at the age of 12, I couldn’t handle the realization just yet.
Now I did have some religious experiences. After confessions I would always have this feeling of relief that I attributed to God’s healing. More distinctly, when I was very young, I had an experience where I seemed to predict a very tragic accident before it occurred. I still sometimes give pause to how my prayers preceding this accident may have somehow helped. I also became friends with some very religious Catholic people who claimed to speak in tongues and were passionate about their “relationship with Christ”. This passion seemed to radiate from them, while it mystified and confused me.
But then I went to college. I had an internship alongside another student who had been “born again”. He insisted that Catholicism wasn’t really Christianity and it annoyed me tirelessly. We would often debate; his arguments always revolving around teachings from the bible. I realized that although I was relatively familiar with Catholic catechism, I was mostly ignorant to what was actually in the bible. The highlights my born again friend made for me didn’t exactly correlate with the idea of Christ I had in my head. I had admired the Beatitudes and Christ’s commandment of Love. I admired the idea of turning the other cheek. There were many little snippets of bible stories that I knew and liked, but my born again friend seemed to know some frightening stories of Jesus’ wrath. These scared and confused me, but opened my eyes. I attended a meeting with my friend where people who wished to convert were learning the bible and about Christ. The students in the group were all very confused and seemed to think Christianity was something that burst inside of you, changing you completely. They discussed “almost feeling Jesus” inside of them, knowing that they needed to learn more in order to fully follow him. I found the whole thing to be absolutely weird and unsettling.
I read the bible. The most disturbing thing I found of the New Testament was the lack of important things. There is no mention of human rights. Nothing is written against slavery or for equality. There is nothing about treating children respectfully. In light of the modern observation that many criminals were abused as children, you’d think the bible would have something in there about taking good care of children, but no, not really. In the bible, women are subservient and gay men are abominations. I reject both of these notions whole-heartedly and am entirely disgusted by the consequences of these biblical teachings.
I started to research the life of Christ, seeking out evidence of his existence. I wanted to know information outside of the bible. Who was this guy, really? What I found dramatically changed my life. There seems to be no reliable source, outside of the bible, that proves the man actually existed. There may be one or two historical books that were written at the time of Christ, but they mention him very little and may or may not have been interpolated by Christians at some later time. But, I thought this guy had many followers? I mean, if he was God and he didn’t write anything down or tell anybody at the time to write things down, how could he possibly expect to affect the world for all of time, especially when not even one historian gave a depiction of him? I had always heard rumors that Christian holidays were really just Pagan or Roman holidays that were slightly altered in order to encourage conversion, but I guess I never really took it too seriously. After discovering the Hilaria festival of the Cybele-Attis cult very closely mirrored the Easter holiday, my doubts seemed to solidify. Without the death and resurrection, the religion lost its foundation. For me, it all pointed to one direction, Christ is not God.
I started listening to lectures by atheists such as James Randi, Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens. I watched Julia Sweeney’s “Letting Go of God”. I reevaluated Nietzsche. I read forums and found many people had a similar story. I took an evolutionary anthropology class and watched countless documentaries focusing on science and life. Biology interested me more. Cosmology interested me more. Finally, I came to the realization that the idea of God was improbable and unimportant. I took note of and fully accepted each reason why religion is a menace to society, for every teaching that stalls moral evolution. Believers are deluded to follow a text that is outdated, whose philosophies are no longer pertinent and in many ways have proven to be detrimental throughout the last 2000 years. My skepticism for religious teachings has now successfully led to fully reevaluating every institution to which I entrust confidence.
Lauren is 23 and a recent graduate from Drexel University with a B.S. in Business Administration. She is a newly converted atheist and has found it makes dating and being a republican quite a challenge.