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When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? [message #442594]

Thu, 13 January 2011 10:51

Spoony
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Registered: January 2006

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Share your stories. When and how did you become a Christian/atheist/agnostic/whatever you consider yourself to be? What made you think so?

I'll start. My story is quite similar to the Hitch's; he says that for him it wasn't a case of becoming an atheist so much as realising he is an atheist. That's how it was for me. Neither of my parents are religious and they let me and my brother and sister make our own minds up (this is mainly because my father's parents were fundamentalist Christians who imposed a strict religious upbringing upon him and my aunt, and they found it absolutely miserable and resolved to do better with us). As for school, I live in a Christian country where Christianity is taught to the kids as though it were fact; i.e. the dumb bible myths are taught with the same certainty as what we're told in geography and maths. And there was no point at which the teacher said "there's no evidence for any of this" or "there are other religions out there too" or, most importantly, "you can just live your life without any of this crap". Also, daily prayer was compulsory.
But I never believed any of this. For some reason it just didn't click, and in the daily prayer at school we just bowed our heads and waited for the headmaster to get it over with. But I never considered myself an atheist; I'd never even heard the word before, and it didn't occur to me to ask "what's the word for someone who doesn't believe in this religious stuff?"

Later on, I was watching comedy on TV. My fellow Englishmen will know Jasper Carrott. Anyone remember that series where he was on trial? I only remember one thing about it - I must've been 14 or 15 at the time - but the prosecutor says about Jasper, in an accusing tone of voice, that he's an 'atheist'. I'd never heard the word before. I was a bright kid and was good with language, but this word was new to me. I went and asked my dad what the word meant, he told me, and I wondered why I'd never been told about this before. How strange that my school had tried to pump one particular religion into me without telling me about the option of atheism, it seemed.

Of course, at the time only one religion had been shown to me. I knew nothing at all about, say, Islam. Since then, my opinion of Christianity has gone very far downhill, and no other religion I've yet come across has struck me as either true or desirable. Still, the concept of freedom of religion (or as I prefer to phrase it, freedom of thought) is extremely important to me, and I'll insist upon it for people of any religion so long as it's there for me too. That's why I'm a harsh critic of the concept of hell, for example.

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		When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Thu, 13 January 2011 10:51
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Herr Surth on Thu, 13 January 2011 10:56
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Thu, 13 January 2011 12:21
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: reborn on Fri, 14 January 2011 05:09
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Dover on Fri, 14 January 2011 06:20
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Herr Surth on Fri, 14 January 2011 06:21
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Starbuzzz on Sat, 15 January 2011 22:02
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Muad Dib15 on Sat, 15 January 2011 22:35
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Starbuzzz on Sat, 15 January 2011 22:56
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Muad Dib15 on Mon, 17 January 2011 23:30
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Tue, 18 January 2011 03:08
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Starbuzzz on Tue, 18 January 2011 05:56
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Tunaman on Tue, 18 January 2011 16:39
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Starbuzzz on Tue, 18 January 2011 18:22
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Tue, 18 January 2011 14:05
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Sat, 15 January 2011 22:53
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Starbuzzz on Sun, 16 January 2011 00:18
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: InternetThug on Sun, 16 January 2011 00:34
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Sun, 16 January 2011 10:25
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: GEORGE ZIMMER on Sun, 16 January 2011 17:09
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Crimson on Sun, 16 January 2011 22:32
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: NukeIt15 on Mon, 17 January 2011 01:40
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: wubwub on Mon, 17 January 2011 15:22
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Tunaman on Wed, 19 January 2011 00:48
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: nikki6ixx on Wed, 19 January 2011 20:09
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Wed, 19 January 2011 20:59
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: GEORGE ZIMMER on Thu, 20 January 2011 07:43
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Thu, 20 January 2011 10:28
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Thu, 20 January 2011 10:37
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Omar007 on Thu, 20 January 2011 10:46
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Thu, 20 January 2011 10:52
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Thu, 20 January 2011 11:32
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: nikki6ixx on Thu, 20 January 2011 12:32
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Thu, 20 January 2011 13:27
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Herr Surth on Thu, 20 January 2011 11:07
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Tunaman on Thu, 20 January 2011 20:06
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Fri, 21 January 2011 11:57
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: HaTe on Fri, 21 January 2011 18:35
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Fri, 21 January 2011 19:55
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Dethdeath on Fri, 21 January 2011 21:54
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: reborn on Sun, 23 January 2011 14:52
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Sun, 23 January 2011 15:18
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: snpr1101 on Sun, 23 January 2011 19:41
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: bmr_71 on Sun, 23 January 2011 17:29
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: bmr_71 on Sun, 23 January 2011 17:35
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Starbuzzz on Sun, 30 January 2011 07:53
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: R315r4z0r on Sun, 23 January 2011 20:53
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: JohnDoe on Mon, 28 February 2011 12:24
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Mon, 28 February 2011 16:35
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: JohnDoe on Tue, 01 March 2011 01:20
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Speedy059 on Thu, 03 March 2011 22:46
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: snpr1101 on Thu, 03 March 2011 23:18
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: Spoony on Sun, 06 May 2012 17:19
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: fredcow9 on Tue, 08 May 2012 17:06
		Re: When did you become a Insert-Religion-Here? By: bunka on Sat, 12 May 2012 13:14

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