Ask-An-Atheist, Episode # 2
It's been awhile since my first post on this idea and I haven't had much time to continue reading "Like Rolling Uphill: Realizing the Honesty of Atheism" by Dianna Narciso. But, since I'm feeling better today, I figured I would make an Ask-An-Atheist post.
From time-to-time back in Michigan and many times here in Texas, I have gotten a general "Why?" question when I admitted to someone that I'm an atheist. They ranged from questions like "Were you ever a christian?", "When did you become an Atheist?", "Why did you choose to be an Atheist?", "Why would you want to be an Atheist?", "Are you an Atheist just because you hate [the christian] god?", or "Why would you want to go to Hell?". So, I wasn't very surprised that this type of question came up on my first post.
The short answer to this is that, even though my parents took me to church as a kid, I never "got it". Religion (christianity, specifically) never made sense to me and the indoctrination that most kids go through never stuck to me. I have always been a curious, questioning kid and I drove the Sunday school teachers nuts. I remember commenting that the Noah's ark playset couldn't actually fit all the animals in the ark. I asked things like, "If Adam & Eve were the first humans, how did their son find a wife?" I once brought in a book about dragons and wanted to read that during the reading time instead of the religious storybooks. I just didn't see a difference--both were fantasy, but my dragon books were more fun. In essence, I was an atheist before I knew what an atheist was.
I went to church with my parents up until my teenage years when my questions and expressed boredom were no longer considered cute. I'm pretty sure that several people at the church knew. I had read more of the bible by age 13 than I think either of my parents ever have. I began going to friend's churchs/synagogs/mosques (thinking that it was just my parents' church that was weird) and researching everything from philosophy to folklore. The closest that I ever came to converting to a religion was Native American folklore. I loved going to the Pow-wows and the reverence for nature spoke to me in a way that nothing else had...but it did nothing to answer my questions. While browsing through a Walden's Books one day with kitty210, I came across a translation of Tao Te Ching and that became my "official" philosophy. After that, I began reading books on zen and took up martial arts. I saw myself as this spiritual, but non-religious person who was perfectly content to do her homework or read a book in middle of a forest or up in a tree.
I'm not sure when it happened, but at some point in high school, I discovered Atheism. It was like looking into the mirror for the first time. It made complete sense and I felt at home with the idea. Unfortunately, the bliss didn't last long. Soon after "coming out" to my mother with completely naive ease, I discovered that atheists aren't seen too kindly. My mother never struck me as a really religious person, but she had grown up in that church and it was her community of friends as well as a connection to her craft hobby. Almost immediately after the fights started, they stopped (at least the direct one, we had many legendary fights oneverything else) and she took the stance that she has had since then of completely ignoring my religious affilation. Somehow, she got me confirmed in her church (without me being present), but that marked the end of the struggle. For the most part, peers were accepting and it was never a big deal. But between the few caustic encounters I had and several friends' experiences with coming out as gay, lesbian, or bisexual--I realised that one doesn't choose to be an Atheist/Agnostic or GLBT. You discover who you are and have a decision to make: to live in denial of who you really are or to be who you are. There are different degrees of being true to yourself and it is definitely not an easy task, but it is seriously better for your health to just accept who you are--be it an Atheist, a gay man, or a bisexual woman.
From time-to-time back in Michigan and many times here in Texas, I have gotten a general "Why?" question when I admitted to someone that I'm an atheist. They ranged from questions like "Were you ever a christian?", "When did you become an Atheist?", "Why did you choose to be an Atheist?", "Why would you want to be an Atheist?", "Are you an Atheist just because you hate [the christian] god?", or "Why would you want to go to Hell?". So, I wasn't very surprised that this type of question came up on my first post.
The short answer to this is that, even though my parents took me to church as a kid, I never "got it". Religion (christianity, specifically) never made sense to me and the indoctrination that most kids go through never stuck to me. I have always been a curious, questioning kid and I drove the Sunday school teachers nuts. I remember commenting that the Noah's ark playset couldn't actually fit all the animals in the ark. I asked things like, "If Adam & Eve were the first humans, how did their son find a wife?" I once brought in a book about dragons and wanted to read that during the reading time instead of the religious storybooks. I just didn't see a difference--both were fantasy, but my dragon books were more fun. In essence, I was an atheist before I knew what an atheist was.
I went to church with my parents up until my teenage years when my questions and expressed boredom were no longer considered cute. I'm pretty sure that several people at the church knew. I had read more of the bible by age 13 than I think either of my parents ever have. I began going to friend's churchs/synagogs/mosques (thinking that it was just my parents' church that was weird) and researching everything from philosophy to folklore. The closest that I ever came to converting to a religion was Native American folklore. I loved going to the Pow-wows and the reverence for nature spoke to me in a way that nothing else had...but it did nothing to answer my questions. While browsing through a Walden's Books one day with kitty210, I came across a translation of Tao Te Ching and that became my "official" philosophy. After that, I began reading books on zen and took up martial arts. I saw myself as this spiritual, but non-religious person who was perfectly content to do her homework or read a book in middle of a forest or up in a tree.
I'm not sure when it happened, but at some point in high school, I discovered Atheism. It was like looking into the mirror for the first time. It made complete sense and I felt at home with the idea. Unfortunately, the bliss didn't last long. Soon after "coming out" to my mother with completely naive ease, I discovered that atheists aren't seen too kindly. My mother never struck me as a really religious person, but she had grown up in that church and it was her community of friends as well as a connection to her craft hobby. Almost immediately after the fights started, they stopped (at least the direct one, we had many legendary fights oneverything else) and she took the stance that she has had since then of completely ignoring my religious affilation. Somehow, she got me confirmed in her church (without me being present), but that marked the end of the struggle. For the most part, peers were accepting and it was never a big deal. But between the few caustic encounters I had and several friends' experiences with coming out as gay, lesbian, or bisexual--I realised that one doesn't choose to be an Atheist/Agnostic or GLBT. You discover who you are and have a decision to make: to live in denial of who you really are or to be who you are. There are different degrees of being true to yourself and it is definitely not an easy task, but it is seriously better for your health to just accept who you are--be it an Atheist, a gay man, or a bisexual woman.