Donating = Loving
Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
Log in or create an account to join the discussions on the Atheist Republic forums.
Donating = Loving
Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
Donating = Loving
Bringing you atheist articles and building active godless communities takes hundreds of hours and resources each month. If you find any joy or stimulation at Atheist Republic, please consider becoming a Supporting Member with a recurring monthly donation of your choosing, between a cup of tea and a good dinner.
FREE E-BOOKS
Get the book "Why There Is No God" and one more book for FREE!
Sign up below for the Atheist Republic Newsletter to get the books.
Record Your Message!
Record your voice here for it to be aired on the Atheist Republic Voicemails Podcast.
Send us your views and opinions, your personal stories, messages of support, comments on recent news, or any comments you would like to share about your part of the world.
Note : By clicking record you are allowing us to broadcast your message on any of our platforms.
Affiliate Disclaimer
Links to atheist related books, shirts and movies and other atheism related products are affiliate links.
All proceeds will go to keeping the Atheist Republic website up and running; providing resources, advocacy, community tools and encouragement to atheists all over the world.
No one came prove if there IS or IS NOT a god/devil thingy(s).
However, I HAVE proven that there is/are no meaningful god(s)/devil(s).
I was a devout catholic when I was 13 or so. Then I switched school and became the target of constant bullying. As any good and decent fanatic, I just ignored everyone and prayed for their salvation. I wouldn't preach to them, but I thought that god was putting them in my way to test my faith.
After a year, my patience ran out, told everyone to go fuckthemselves and their mothers. They laughed and started bullying one of the kids I had insulted. In a way, they welcomed me to the club, male bonding and all that. A few months later I challenged god (which is a very terrible sin, btw) and lightning didn't strike. I realized all the pain I had endured was for nothing, and that I was actually alone in this world. So I started to mix with the animals, made new friends and got elected as school president or whatever. After a lot of campaigning I managed to make religion classes optional in my school, claiming we had a protestant among us, this was a lie of course. They were all agnostic/undevout catholics. We voted, and not one of my classmates picked religion. The teacher cried and said we were under demonic influences.
If god was actually testing me, I failed with honors. :D
I've spent 50 years studying every religion under the stars! Wasting my time searching for the "truth". The only truth that I have discovered is this: There are only two possibilities => 1) God does not exist, --OR-- 2) God is the most evil thing ever to have existed.
Since number 2 makes little sense, the only right answer is number 1.
At the age of 61 I studied the LATER writings of Mark Twain. The ones he had locked away until 100 years after his death. After formal studies in psychology, philosophy, theology, social work, and world history, Samuel Clements turned out to be just about the smartest guy I ever met (in print, of course.) And he sounds a lot like you.
One thing I know. A cynic is simply a disappointed optimist. Former Christians make much more bitter atheists than former Buddhists.
I have to say I am disappointed in old Sammy for chickening out for 100 years or so: but have to admit I have not announced my own conversion to all my Christian friends, family and associates. time will tell whether or not I will disappoint myself, too.
I grew up in the US, in the suburbs of Minneapolis/St. Paul. My parents didn't force religion on us nor did we go to church. I would spend an occasional weekend with my Paternal Grandmother and, outside of weeding her yard, she would drag me to her Catholic Church on Sundays. I learned to hate that pretty quick.
The only other exposure to Christianity I had growing up was the Fundamentalists invading the apartment complex we lived in to invite all the kids to their Bible Excursions on Sundays. They would send buses, and bribe kids with food, fun, and games. My sister and I tagged along on more than one occasion but it never got any better. It was a torrent of guilt, shame, and preaching where you would be rewarded for your blind faith and criticized for you ability to reason and ask questions. I was, of course, in the second category, and my poor sister fell clearly in the first (that continues today as well).
I became a skeptic pretty early in my life as a result of all that, and the questions continued to pour out of me all my life. Deep down (in the place I now know Core Beliefs reside) I didn't question there was some type of deity out there, or that I had a soul, and that upon death I was "going someplace else." Those core beliefs are really hard to just drop and it takes me thinking about that when I am getting frustrated with Christians now-a-days who just refuse to see reason.
I just never committed to taking the name Atheist until very recently. Last year I was still working through being an Agnostic. I felt pretty sure we had all been created at some point by some ambivalent being, and that the body I am currently residing in is just a vehicle I will use until I die and abandon it like a broken down car. It didn't take much more beyond challenging those baseless beliefs that I finally admitted to myself I just don't believe any of it based on a lack of evidence. That was difficult to do because those core beliefs just resist it because it is all you have ever known.
Jay, those "core beliefs" are such a part of our culture, even for the "non-religious." I can think back through difficult times when I was able to hold it together only because of my faith and the support of the "faithful" around me. Losing that support system is a major blow. Maybe that's one reason I didn't give it up until late in life. I guess I believe that we have an evolutionary need for religion, for a belief in a big Mommy or Daddy god that will care for us and make everything come out alright. It enables us to take risks and endure hardship and disappointment. It is the ultimate enabler of postponement of gratification, a key to the success of individuals or groups. No major civilization has developed without an organized religion. Virtually every ethical system is based on a religious foundation. Even "humanistic" values have at their core the remnants of lately abandoned religious beliefs. Are we stuck with that?
I went to my community church Sunday, with family. The sermon was on how our actions in this brief lifetime affect our fate for all eternity, with emphasis on the rewards. Sort of a kinder, gentler "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," I was reminded of the tale of a Buddhist nun who was known for walking the streets with a lantern and a bucket of water. When asked why, she would reply "I am going to burn down Heaven and quench the fires of Hell, so we can do good without coercion." But would we?
i couldn't believe that the MOST merciful being would put billions of of people in hell just for not believing and having blind faith. further research led me to theorize that a certain group of people wrote the quran in order to control society.
When I was younger the stories of the bible didn't make sense to me. I figured it was just doubt. As I got older I observed that people who were terrible people often seemed to be the moat religious. The final straw on my back was after praying a lot and with all my heart I didn't get the job I NEEDED. After that I decided that there was no way that an all loving god could allow my family and I to be homeless. After accepting the truth that there was no god all the doubts in my head as a kid made sense and it opened my eyes to the world that religion hides under bs smoke screens. Now im know as the militant atheist to my friends in a town with 1 church for every 200 people
I was raised a Lutheran Christian all my life and wasn't ever really into it but I still believed it because that is the only thing I was taught. It wasn't until I tore my ACL in middle school football and went into a depression because I thought my athletic life was over that I realized no matter how hard I pray and believe everything around me still came crumbling down to the point that I would hold a blade to my throat and cry almost every night until I fell asleep. That is when my doubts came and I became agnostic( because I was always told atheists worshipped the devil) and started to ask questions and got circular answers. Because I was still depressed I couldn't deal with normal school so I found a school that was self paced and online and after a lot of determination I graduated but I had just turned sixteen so I couldn't start on my future or anything so I would surf the web reading things about different religions trying to find answers in all my spare time and I came across the definition of atheism and was very surprised because it described me, so I started reading about it and decided this maybe the right thing for me. When I turned seventeen I joined the army but once again got injured at the end of Infantry OSUT( One Station Unit Training) but this time I didn't go into a depression because I learned I'm in control of my life and I only get this short time to make the most of it and that nothing comes next so I shouldn't waste it. I am 18 and currently waiting to go back next October.
Pages