Losing The Faith

When ever I tell Someone that I'm an atheist, you can always (in the south anyways) see the cringe in their faces eventhough they try or think they have hidden it. This stark moment of comedy is immediatly followed by either one of three things the shameful look of !ity, "She seems like such a nice girl, I wonder what ha!!ened." #tter shock and ab$ect horror, "What% What do you &'()%" 'very once in a while I run across an in*usitive and logical human who actually says, "+h really, how did you come to this conclusion%" ,learly we will be discussing the later of the three since the first two arent really worth the time or energy to discuss. The later, however is a story I do en$oy e-!laning *uite fre*uently. .et me first start this $ourney at the begining as all good stories do. I was born to a wonderfully conservative christian cou!le in a small community in the rural south. &y !arents, although both college educated, were dee!ly religous and indoctrinated me into the church at an early age. This is common for most !eo!le in that children are automaticlly assumed to go the same !ath as the !arents. We attended a *uiet, conservative church. (lthough racially mi-ed, which was almost unheard of at the time, it was, in hind sight a bit of a cult. (t the time i never realised, but looking back..... "We only fellowshi! with our own !eo!le. /o not allow yourselves or your children to be swe!t u! by the carnal nature of the common man. /ont allow your children to have friends at their schools, as you never know how they maight be tainted. If you are single, make sure you only date !eo!le in the church, as ooutsiders would not understand our laws."

(s a child these things rarely register, thats $ust the way it was. 0ecoming older however, did begin to shed a strange light on my wonderful church community. &y !arents are your ty!ical lower middle class family. &y mom was a teacher and my father sold insurance. With their college back grounds, they have always !ushed education and the accumilation of knowledge. &y father, in !articular, is a s!ace, science and tech $unkie. I have been reading since i was three, so by the age of ten I was devouring anything I could read at an alarming rate. /uring that time is when com!rehision of what I was reading started sinking in and the *uestions begin to rise. "/addy, /addy we learned about dinosaurs today and how they lived a long time ago." &y father would smile and say,"+h really%" "1es", I re!lied, "but why are they not in the bible%" 2elooked at me very amused and said , "They are in the bible their called leviathans." "+h, ok", was all the res!onse I could muster. (t ten years old I could never have imagined that that this *uestion would always be a refrence !iont in my mind of how I started losing my faith. 0eing a nerdy kid from the country there was nothing I liked to do more than read, maybe a little basketball here and there. (s a teen, I was of course, e-!ected to !ay more attention and be involved in church and its activities. It was at this time that not only *uestions , but real concern started to grow. There was alot of talk about 'us' vs. 'them', and the things that ha!!ened to 'them' was not good, not good at all. "Want not for material things in this world, they are for the carnal and savage man. 1ou shall have eternal and everlasting life in the kingdom of heaven, while these moral degenerates shall be cast out like the beast they are and burn for all eternity."

That can't be right, I thought to my self. I could not have heard him correctly. Surely not everyone who is not a !art of our church shall !erish. This $ust couldn't be true. I was so distraught. I couldnt slee!, I made it my business to s!eak to my father immediatly the ne-t morning. "/addy, is what the !astor said yeaterday true%" 2e !ut his !a!er down and looked at me, "Whats that", he asked. "Is everyone not in our church going to hell%" I re!lied. 2e calmly answered, "yes". I looked at him incredulously, "even grandma%" I gas!ed. 2e got this sad look on his face as he !ut his !a!er down and turned to me and said, "'ven grandma." 3or me that was the thorn in the rose4 I could deal with the Satturday services, no school s!orts, no slee!overs, and even no school dances. This was completly unaccetable. &y grandmother, was the e!idemy of holiness. She was sweet, firm but kind, as well as humble. She was a Sunday school teacher, member of the choir and usher board at her church. 3or my father to tell me that she wasnt getting into heaven and would be damned for all eternity, sim!ly because of the church she went to, baffled me beyond reason. I decided then and there that something was u! with this religin cra!, and i was going to figure it out, no matter what. I started college a bright eyed o!!timitic seveteen year old. (way from my !arents and my church for the first time, I wanted to learn it all. +ne the first classes I took was a worls religion class. Wow, were my eyes o!ened4 I had no idea there were more religions than the basic five you hear about on a fairly regular basis. There were literally hundreds4 (ll denominations, all sects, some have been dead for thousands of years but

all religions. There were over twenty storys that have the holy mother and divine !regnacy that is de!icted in ,hristianity. This was mind blowing to me. 2ow could all of this be true. It could not be !ossible. 1et it was. The mor I read and researched the more frustration and confusion i felt. 2ow could everything I'd ever been taught be wrong% /id my !arents know% Was it wrong for me to be researching this% So many *uestions, so much information, and so many o!inions. It wasnt until after my first run at college that I was able to comfortably say i didnt conform to any religious thinking. (lthough not a !o!ular stament it ke!t co5workers and well meaning friends from inviting me to their churchs, singles nights and what not. I began to read, really read u! on the !ossibility of their being no 6od. Scarey at first, didnt have anyone to talk to about it. Then I meet /awkins, 2awking and ,arl Sagan. "Think of how many religions attem!t to validate themselves with !ro!hecy. Think of how many !eo!le rely on these !ro!hecies, however vague, however unfulfilled, to su!!ort or !ro! u! their beliefs. 1et has there ever been a religion with the !ro!hetic accuracy and reliability of science% ... )o other human institution comes close." 55 ,arl Sagan, The /emon52aunted World, !age 78 This was the begining of the end of my life long !ursuit for satisfaction in answers to religon. I found that i wasnt cra9y, and i wasnt alone. In the history channel's 'Secrets of the 0ible', i would find to!ics to research and debunct a few myths of my own. I was begining to reconcile my mind with my heart and find my true !ath. It wasnt until I meet my fiancee, 6riss, that i would have the su!!ort i needed to to "come out" as an atheist. 2e himself had been a !racticing atheist for years when we meet. one of the first things

he said to me has always stayed true. ")ever believe anything said to you at face value. If you want to know the truth of something, take the time, do the reasearch, and find out for yourself." This, more than anything has made all the differance in my life. Since then I have been donig $ust that. #nfortuantly for religion, I am a child of logic, thought and reasoning. I do not believe in boogy men, demons or god. Their sim!ly isnt enough evidence to !rove to me that there is an omni!itent being guiding us through life. If there is, he is a sick, sadistic s.o.b. and i want nothing to do with him.