I did a thorough search and found nothing like this posted.
I am an atheist. I have been an atheist since 2008.
My background:
I was born Roman Catholic in SW Michigan. I married my wife who is also Roman Catholic and continues to be today.
The process of coming to my disbelief started with the WTC attacks and over the course of 7 years, my thought process went like this:
[quote]
Those that attacked the WTC were Muslim extremists. They had faith that what they were doing was right that that their deaths would take them to heaven to be with Allah. They were obviously crazy, but they had faith in their god… just like the Mormons, the Hindus, the 7th Day Adventists… and the Catholics. If they are wrong in their faith, how do I know I am correct in mine? I had to be intellectually honest with myself and admit that I couldn’t.
So I struggled with that for a number of years. I talked to priests and other people of faith about this and they all said the same thing, that I should just have faith. Well, I couldn’t do that because every other religion has faith just like mine. So to me, faith was no way to know if any kind of a god existed.
That was when I came to be an atheist. I remember standing in my office thinking about all of this and saying to myself, “I don’t believe in God”.
Since that time, I have done a lot of research. I listen to a number of podcasts about rationalism and atheist issues. I’ve come out to my immediate family and for the most part, they are taking it well. My parents did not take it so well, but they still talk to me and want to spend time with me so I suppose that could have gone a lot worse.
So if you have any questions, please ask away and I will give you my perspective on living godless.
I’m an atheist as well, I keep it to myself IRL to avoid being shunned. I work with an ark-load of xtians and the industry is very small even though I’m IT.
I believe what m’learned colleague means to say is that atheists are not exactly a rarity on this board. But who knows? It could be good. Or it could turn into another squabble over how one defines “atheist” and “agnostic” as these threads always do.
But anyway - apart from your parents, have you had any notable reactions (positive or negative) from friends, family and co-workers?
One of my good friends told me that he was impressed, not only that I was an atheist, but that I was willing to talk about it, which is interesting because in general, I don’t talk about it much. Unless I am asked, I don’t bring it up because I think that religious belief is a personal thing and that it should be kept personal. I don’t like it (and never did even when I was a believer) when other people put their religion in my face, so to speak.
I was just plain scared to talk to my parents about it. I came out to them last year and the reason I waited so long was because I knew they would blow the proverbial gasket… and they did.
My mom was starting to see things that I was liking in Facebook (some atheist groups I belong to and activists that I follow). I had never posted anything related to my atheism to my newsfeed, but things I was liking were showing up on my mom’s feed, so they asked me over to their place to discuss it.
I told them straight out that I didn’t believe in any kind of a god. They yelled, they tried to convince me otherwise, but I stood firm. At the end of it all, my mom said, “I just don’t want to see all this atheism stuff on my Facebook. Can’t you just unlike that stuff?” I told her I was a grown man and that she couldn’t tell me what I could or could not like on Facebook, so she unfriended me. We still talk on the phone and they come to visit so the facebook thing isn’t that big of a deal, but they definitely don’t like that I am an atheist.
I know it’s MPSIMS, but it’s kind of the superlative of pointless, isn’t it?
I don’t collect stamps, do you think I should start a thread about that? You know, I could talk about what kind of stamps I don’t collect. Do I not collect foreign stamps, or do I not collect domestic stamps. Do I not collect commemorative stamps, or stamps with birds on them. Is the guy who doesn’t collect cancelled stamps a different sort of hobbyist than the guy who doesn’t collect un-cancelled stamps?
Let me know when major political figures say that people that don’t collect postage stamps shouldn’t become President of the United States, or may not even be “real” citizens.
My username is a throwback to when I was more militant. Throwing my lack of belief into everyone’s teeth. Spending a year unemployed taught me to keep my Work at work and Home at home.
For me, there was no formal process. My mother was xtian but she was also very introspective, one of the things I miss most was out debates. It hurt me very deeply learning that she was worrying about me and my soul while she was dying of cancer.
My wife knows, she doesn’t accept it and thinks it’s something I’ll grow out of. She’s been waiting more than 20 years. My close friends know and couldn’t care less. My extended family doesn’t acknowlege it and rarely talk about with me. I think they take it personally as many of them define themselves by the church.
The same church that was used to justify keeping us slaves. Strange.
