Former theists turned atheists: what arguments were most effective in turning you?

Great Debates
1

Not really a debate, but this is the default forum for religion threads.

To atheists who used to be theists - especially to those who were the most hardcore, fundamentalist types - what is the most effective argument or point you ever heard from atheists? What is the the thing that, if it didn’t stop you in your tracks, at least stayed with you, made you think, made you reevaluate?

I will say that I’ve asked this question of atheists elsewhere, and the most common answer I’ve ever gotten for what turned theists into atheists is simply reading the Bible, but I’d also like to know if anything atheists typically say on these kinds of message boards (or IRL) actually permeates. I’m sure that dismissive “sky fairy” comments do not, but what does?

2

I was eight years old or so and was at temple for some reason or another. It was winter and the ground was icy, and I ran ahead of my family. My mother yelled after me to be careful and I told her that I didn’t have to be because “it’s the house of God.” She told me that I should still be careful so I didn’t fall and crack my head open or break a limb. That was the last time I seriously entertained the notion that there was a god… I don’t remember the process exactly but I do have a distinct memory or being twelve years old and going to a meeting of the Jewish Temple Club where I was the only one who, during a debate on God, said that I has no belief in God at all.

3

The great thing about Judaism is that you’re allowed to say that without being pilloried for it.

4

True. I later went on to be the VP of the JTC, spent many summers at a Jewish sleepyaway camp and had a hell of a lot of fun in NFTY programs.

5

I don’t think I was ever a hardcore fundamentalist believer.

In my case, probably the biggest thing in my losing my religious beliefs was exposure to other religious beliefs. I would see other people who were as devout as the believers in my faith but whose faiths were incompatible with mine. It made me realize that true faith and devout belief were possible even if there was no foundation for it. And once I realized that, I realized I had no more basis to my religious beliefs than they did.

6

Well, I don’t know if I was a hard core theist type, but I was raised Catholic in a very Catholic family which sot of qualifies me I suppose (of course I’m not an atheist either, but an agnatheist ;)). I’d say that part of it was just my nature…I was always curious about stuff, read a lot once I learned to read (I was around 10 when I learned to read English) and always liked science. And reading the Bible (or listening constantly while it was droned at me and I did the Catholic dance) I just found it increasingly more unbelievable. It didn’t helpmthat my aunts, uncles, cousins and various other relations were constantly ramming it down my throat…and constantly attacking anything to do with science, evolution and, oddly ‘white people music’ (which translated at the time to rock and roll…the devils playthings!).

It all sort of crystalized for me when I went to college (that’s also the time I threw off my liberal Democratic ways and became a Republican for a time…even joined the college Republican group in college :p). For a while it was rough, and even now some of my family doesn’t accept the way I am, but it’s gotten better. I’ve always been a bit of a black sheep in more than religion and politics to my extended family.

-XT

7

I can’t recall exactly what started swaying me away from religion, but I remember what cemented my atheism was trying to reconcile an omnipotent, omniscient, and benevolent being.

8

The Problem of Evil took my theism outside, beat the shit out of it, and stole its lunch money.

9

I was a fairly strong believing Catholic up until my teens. Nobody coerced me into that either - my father is an atheist and my mother was a go-to-mass-on-Christmas-and-Easter kind of Catholic. It was my idea to become an altar boy and feel strongly about God.

And I know it’s a cliche, but in my case it really happened: I simply reached the age of reason. There was no one moment of change that I can remember. I just gradually came to realize that all of that dogma was rather unlikely, and I left it behind without much drama.

10

Occam’s Razor. The understanding that ideas like natural selection and emergent behavior are more economical than an ex nihilo Creator. Furthermore, that these theories are testable and falsifiable.

I still struggle with finding a basis for ethics, though, as well as meeting the human appetite for ritual, mystery, and transcendence. I also miss the community of a parish. All these things are also part of being a believer, which is why I am very uncomfortable with dogmatic “All religion is bullshit” atheism.

11

I was raised Catholic and was a real believer until I was about 12. Then as I thought up more and more questions that had no answers. The whole edifice just crumbled .
Then I noticed girls were wearing lumpy shirts and got distracted for a few decades.

12

I was never a hardcore/fundie theist. I was brought up catholic, went to a catholic grade school, church on Sunday, that type of stuff. There was no ‘argument’ that turned me so to speak, but some time in grade school, I still remember thinking “Wait, WTF, this just doesn’t make sense” and that was it. Kind of like learning that Santa isn’t real. It was like a switch got flipped. I’ve always been more of a hard science guy, I don’t know what we were discussing at the time, but it was probably something like creationism or miracles or rising from the dead etc…something that takes faith
The stories, the fables, lessons, someone sold their brother to slavery, killed a sheep, she’s a whore, he helped the poor, they nailed this guy to a cross…no big deal I’m even willing to believe (some) of these events actually did happen at some point in history…turning water into wine…snapping your fingers and creating everything, if I’m a good boy I’ll live forever in heaven, but if I’m bad I go to hell and burn…and expecting me to take it as the indisputable truth, that’s where I cut you off.

Having said all that, I don’t think I was ever really a theist. I think I was a theist by default, I was a believer only at a time when I wasn’t aware that there was another option. But I suspect that’s true of most people that ‘convert’ at some point before high school.

13

I’ve never been hardcore anything. I’m Catholic and I do miss the Church. I guess I miss the belongingness but I just can’t believe the faith anymore.

I was given a copy of Late, Great Planet Earth in about 1972 and, I’m ashamed to say, I believed the whole thing and tended towards fundiness for a while. But, as others have said, I just grew up and the whole thing simply didn’t make sense anymore.

I think the fact that we have no real evidence that Jesus ever said the things which were attributed to him also tipped me towards agnosticism (I don’t think I’m an atheist - maybe I just like sitting on the fence). The fact that the gospels were written so long after the events they talk about is also a factor. Another telling point, for me, is that the authors of the gospel didn’t actually know Jesus at all. That blew me away when I found out.

14

You know that Stephen Roberts quote about how atheists just disbelieve in one more god than theists? Well, I more or less logically eliminated each popular conception of god(s) during my childhood (over the course of several years) and eventually ran out of gods I didn’t believe in.

15

I wasn’t hardcore, but my step mom read the bible to us every night. I was usually trying to sneak a cigarette from her pack while she read, so I’m surprised at just how much of the bible reading I actually absorbed. Anyway, I struggled with matters of faith. My reasoning said no way can this stuff be true. But I was under a lot of pressure to believe from my family.

I decided to read the bible myself to try to put an end to all the questions I had. I hoped that reading would cement my faith. But as you suggested in your op, the opposite is what happened. I could not stomach what I was reading. The book of Daniel was as far as I could get. I decided then that the God of the Bible was not someone I could worship. I studied some more, tried Buddhism on. My searching is actually what lead me to this board. As a matter of fact, it was a post by you, Dio. Your obvious expertise is what made me continue to read.

Someone here referred to themselves as a soft atheist and I guess that’s where I’m at right now. But there have been several posts here that have made a big impact on me. The story about the rain water in a puddle is one I’d never heard before and that was a biggie. But for me, it’s not just one thing. It’s a combination of a lot of things. My disgust with the books of Daniel and Judges gave me permission in my mind to ask harder questions and let go of some of the fear I had. And it’s sad to let go of this fairy tale you’ve been fed. This process is a lot like grieving the death of a loved one.

16

This was it for me, too. I grew up in places that were Shinto, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, and Christian. They were all as convinced that they were following the true path and they all thought the others were misguided. I had given up on religion by my mid teens. Giving up on the idea of God took a lot lot longer.

17

TLDR version deleted, here’s the synopsis.

I used to suffer from religion. But I cured it. With my BRAIN.

I went to a Pentecostal church for most of my childhood. They’re pretty hard-core fundies; believe in faith healing, speaking in tongues, etc. I questioned beliefs for a long time, even as a kid, though I externally bought into it enough to fit in most of the time. Even went to Bible study and other church activities.

There were no arguments that swayed me, it was simply the accumulation of life-experience and knowledge that showed contradictions to every single core belief they held. The final blows were my mother’s death from breast cancer and subsequent dissolution of my family, and having a best friend who helped me get through what is the absolute worst time in my life to-date turn out to be gay.

Between seeing my mother reduced from one of the most articulate people I knew to a bloated parody of that woman from the masses of brain tumors, and one of the most supportive, caring, unconditionally loving people I’ve ever met being something that the “good people” of the church treated with hate and disgust, the remaining shreds of my faith didn’t really stand a chance.

I went to one more church meeting in college, and found that I rather pitied them because I realized that they needed something I’d outgrown by that time. They would never be self-sufficient even if they stopped going to church and removed themselves from the community aspect of religion, because they internally would always be leaning on the crutch of god.

By that time, I’d gone past my initial reactions of treating god more or less like an abusive parent, to what I now know was a form of atheism. God was simply irrelevant to my life. I knew that I could survive completely without faith.

So, you could say that god convinced me that he didn’t exist. If I hadn’t had the experiences I had, I probably would be a good church-going boy, even though I’ve always been the kind of person who questioned things. Due to a severe crisis in my life, I went from being a bit apathetic about religion to rejecting it completely.

18

This quote is what finally tipped me over from agnosticism into true atheism.

I was raised in a fairly hard-core Catholic family, but had entertained skepticism pretty much ever since reading about Greek myths as a kid. But I waffled on becoming an actual atheist until I thought about this quote, and realized, this is stupid. The nebulous fuzzy-edged Judeo-Christianish God that I refused to admit I didn’t believe in, was as real as Zeus. Screw this crap.

19

The concept of Hell is so obviously, viscously, the construct of a frustrated, human mind.

So is the need for controlling sexual expression.

20

Missed the edit window; can someone correct my spelling?