When I was 4 years old I had the uncertainty of whether or not it was safe to question the existence of God. That was approximately when my parents began to inform me of their religion of Catholicism. Before teaching me I was already a curious child at the age of 3 who questioned a lot and wanted answers. I think they began exposing me when I was 4 because they didn't think me capable of understanding when I was 3 but I was already aware of my surroundings at 3 years old. Something seemed off when I was being taught about religion because it felt unnecessary to perform certain rituals like prayers and felt restricted by the rules supposedly mandated by God. Some rules were common sense that people should or shouldn't be doing regardless of religion but others didn't seem right.

For example one of the first things that my parents told me was that it was a sin to question God as one of the many rules that God mandates. I've already been questioning a lot of other things because that's how I get closer to an answer and I've found that it's best to question things when you don't know or are unsure about something and ultimately no matter how much you question something at whatever angle there should come up to be a same answer in the end because I've already come across answers that way with other things. I figured there should be one right answer to a question because there can't be 2 answers to the same question. This seemed obvious when I've noticed company commercials claiming their brand to be the best while the competitor claims to be the best too. They can't both possibly be the best only one could be the best. In this same way I've noticed how there existed several religions with their own rituals and rules that are mandated by their God. That made me think about why there existed several religions if there supposedly should only be one that is right. Why would others conduct in a different religion if they know it's wrong. I asked my mom one day if our religion is the right one then why are there people that believe in other religions? Her response to that was, "Oh that's a really good question", in a way that made her hesitate as if that was a complex controversial question making sure to think of a way that would cater to what she believes and answered, "Other people follow in different religions because they think their religion is the right one but really ours is the right one". To me that sounded like ours is just as potentially wrong as the others and what's to say that there's a religion that's right but that none are.

There's no way that all religions could be right, there's the thought that there may be one that's right, but there's also the possibility that none are correct. I've always had my doubts about the existence of God but I considered the idea in the beginning out of open mindedness and out of fear. Hearing the notion that questioning God was a sin inserted a fear in me that made me question what if there is a God that considers this as a sin? That would mean that I would get punished in life and may end up going to hell. My doubts were stalled by this fear. I took a whole year of consideration to religion and made sure not to question God just in case but instead investigated religious concepts mostly from my parents' religion but also from what I could notice from others. Religion seemed pretty contradictary to me and its validness seemed doubtful. From the beginning it came off to me as mental slavery to not be able to question God and simply follow along but since I wasn't suppose to have those thoughts I didn't fully have them.

Finally after a while of cautiously investigating I decided no more. It didn't seem as much of a risk anymore after all my investigation and I took the decision to question God because it seemed stupid to not be allowed to question. How could this God consider questioning his existence a sin and punish you gravely if he's so perfect and just. That didn't seem like perfection to me and I "confronted" this God. I "told" him, " I'm sorry about questioning you but I'm a child and can't help it, I think I have the right to be able to question you especially since I'm a child and don't know much about everything but it's because of that lack of knowledge that makes me want to know more and question things. That's why I think I should be permitted to question you and since you're supposedly so real, questioning your existence would only end up further proving it so it's really to your own benefit to have people believe in you through seeing that there's rational or concrete proof rather than through blind belief and I'm sorry for saying that but if you could give me proof then I will never question you again and believe you without doubt and if not then I will further question without hesitation to get to the truth". Plus I didn't think that God would want to allow someone especially a child to go astray and try to retain people instead if it were simple.

I "told" God to do something simple for me because I understood that he might be busy and needed to use his powers for bigger things and also to prove that I wasn't just taking advantage of him by making him give me a gift as my demand for proof but rather something that I won't be able to use or keep. My parents taught me that God listens to everyone but especially the good people and double especially good children. I was a good child that followed religion but more out of obligation and gave it 85%. I figured I was pretty high up on God's list of people to listen to and would become more of a dire situation for it to be a situation of questioning him so he had to be likely of listening to me. I told him to have one of the cereal boxes on top of my refrigerator to fall within specific hours of the following day. (I knew that wouldn't be compelling proof and there was a probability that a cereal box could fall coincidentally the next day but it would stall for more time if it happened). I picked an hour for the morning, afternoon, evening, and night time just to give him options and all he had to do was pick one and make it happen once that day. I waited and nothing happened. I gave him another chance and "told" him, " I understand that maybe just maybe you were too busy but I'm giving you another chance, my doubt is building up and you're losing a following but just to show how fair and considerate I am I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt".

This time I "told" God to have any cereal box fall within any time of the following day. I waited and nothing happened, all the boxes were in the exact same position as they were before. I gave him one last chance I told him, "Okay things aren't looking good for you here but this is your final chance or you're losing a follower and this would mean that all this time I've just been talking to myself". This final time I told him to have any one of the cereal boxes fall but this time I placed one of them on the very edge of the refrigerator in such a way that it very much could of ended up falling on it's own. I wasn't trying to make sure that there was a reason to stall for time, what I figured was if this experiment turns out not to point to God then that would be a way of sort of prooving it by giving so many chances and yet still nothing. I left a cereal box in such a way that if the door of the refrigerator opened there was a good probability that it could fall on it's own. I waited and nothing, the refrigerator was opened several times within the day and none of the cereal boxes changed position in any way not even the wrigged one. That's when I assured myself to completely doubt and question God but really by then I already didn't believe because I always had a percentage of doubt in my mind but I didn't allow it to grow out of fear. I faced the uncertainty argument of the potential risk of safety and proved it to myself that it's a bunch of nonsense.

Nothing bad happened soon after my little experiment, everthing was normal as it would be and had neutral and good things happen to me within that time period which really furthered my point of view. I grew up to have good and bad things happen along my lifetime just like any other person would but I know that it's not a result of any imaginery God interfering in or controlling our lives. We are in control of what we want in our lives and who we want to be. As for the supposed afterlife uncertainty I doubt that there would be one but if there were to be one I think that we would all end up going to the same place regardless of what we've done in our life but it also seems like that place might run out of space or get crowded at some point from the trillions of people that die all along history so that seems questionable.

Even for argument's sake if we were to say that there is a God and sends people to some hell for not believing in him then that would sound heavily unjust and not sound like a perfect loving God that religious people depict it to be. If people must insist on his existence then he really seems more like a jealous bully that only wants positive attention and unnecessary worship and punishment for those who go out line. I wouldn't want to live a life in fear and restriction because some imaginery overlord wants you to conduct your life in a certain way. To me not believing is the safety. Not because I don't want there to be a God but because it very much seems to not be one and believing in one is such a waste of a life thinking that you're life is destined only for certain things and if things don't turn out it was because it was destined. There is so much proof, evidence, and speculation that there is no God that there really isn't an uncertainty and you don't have to be some fancy rocket scientist to know and realize that. You can suficiently figure it out as a child through basic fundamental use of logic and reasoning.

You don't even need fancy theories, hyposeses, or experiments. Simple ones sufise to see the obvious but if you must attempt to look at everything from every angle to every level to be convincing, no matter from what angle you look at it everything points to the lack of a God whether through hard evidence and theoretical explaination or through speculation and basic logic. With all of this there is no such thing as uncertainty, there's only uncertainty in those who believe and are still trapped in their self imposed slavery who need to be set free.

- Cesar Valencia