Have you had a major shift in your personal belief system, where major means embracing a completely different set of beliefs?
I’m not asking about changing denominations or sects within one major religion (Protestant to Catholic, Sunni to Shi’a, Orthodox to Reconstructionalist) but about shifting between major religious groups. Were you a Sikh who has become a follower of Islam? Were you raised with no religion and are now a Jew? Have you left Christianity to become a Hindu? Have you made a major change like that more than once?
Obviously there’s likely some grey area, where you perhaps had a period, even a protracted period, where you were iffy on the beliefs of X before you embraced Y. But this is more a question of active identification.
As always, feel free to expand and offer brickbats if something is missing from the poll.
Answering for myself, I was raised and baptized in the Assemblies of God, a Pentecostal, evangelical Christian denomination. I even attended an A/G college for a period of time. Shortly thereafter I converted to Judaism, and was observant within the Orthodox community. I’m still a Jew, though no longer Orthodox.
Well, I answered, but I’m troubled by the poll implying that anyone has “no religious beliefs.” I suppose it’s a semantic thing. But I consider an atheist as having a religious belief–a positive assertion of no divine being or force. Should anyone want the details I was raised by agnostics leaning towards atheism and am now a Christ follower.
I was a devout fundamentalist Christian as a pre-teen/teen. I was not raised in the faith, I was just born-again at the age of 11 or 12. When I was 17 I became an anti-religious atheist nihilist, than a non-religious agnostic. I’ve been an atheist existentialist Buddhist now for about 8 years. Though there is no mysticism in my Buddhist practice, I consider my Buddhist beliefs fairly strong, enough to consider myself religious.
Raised Catholic. Was a real believer at one point. Shifted to vaguely religious non-Catholic skeptic, and from there to atheism. Briefly reverted to Christianity at one point in my young adult life. Currently not sure what to believe and not sure if I can even find the answers I want. I suspect there might be something to this God stuff, but I’m not a Christian and I’m pretty darn sure I never will be again.
I was raised Catholic. Catholic Grade school, Church every Sunday with the family plus once a week with school. At some point in grade school I remember thinking “WTF?!” and that was the end of that. It was like a light switch, like finding out Santa isn’t real. I was still confirmed in high school, but that was more to appease my parents then anything else (it also allowed be to get married in a church someday).
I was raised Catholic and considered myself a devout believer until my early teens. Left the church when I was 17. Futzed around with agnosticism for several years afterward and then decided I was really an atheist. Which is where I am now.
Raised Missouri Synod Lutheran in an overwhelmingly Catholic city, but my Dad’s side of the family was Jewish; ranging from Modern Orthodox to Reform. I converted to Judaism four years ago, following a brief interlude attending mostly Unitarian Universalist churches. It just seemed like a closer match to my spiritual beliefs than Lutheranism. If there is such a thing as a soul, I believe mine is Jewish.
My family, both the Lutheran side and the Jewish side, were all very supportive.
Methodist to UCC to Jew Curious, a brief dip into Hinduism to Buddhism. I went from theist to atheist but since I’ve started taking Buddhism more seriously I’ve started questioning atheism. I’m not starting to believe in gods so much as I’m realizing there’s too much out there I don’t know; I can’t be sure of anything anymore.
Raised nominally Presbyterian, then mom remarried and converted to uber-Catholicism… and dragged us all to mass every Sunday which I never willingly took part in. In my early twenties I converted to Islam, but am not very religious. I waffle between agnostic and Islam.
Not to hijack but, by your definition, everyone would be religious about anything they don’t believe in, Santa, the Easter Bunny, Klingons, anything. It’s more than just semantics. It’s wrong. I’m not religious about things I don’t believe in, and being anti theist is not only not a religious belief, it’s not a belief at all.
Your poll options don’t really cover my circumstance. I was born into and raised by a religious family, although I never believed myself. In my late teens, at my first opportunity, I stopped attending church services, and have been religion-free ever since.
Thanks for the clarification. Perhaps it’s my definitions that are muddled. I’ve always considered religion as part of a worldview, and thought of atheism as one option for religion. When we were kids, we put that under any religion things we had to fill out (this was more common in the 1950s). I’m willing to be corrected on this–not a major issue to me–and it certainly removes my concerns about the poll structure.
Devout Post-VaticanII-Catholic —> Devout Catholic/Anglican liberal Christian —> Questioning Christian ----> Benign, existentialist, humanistic atheist. Sometimes I want to believe in a God, especially of the Fonzy Christ variety, but I just don’t see enough evidence to warrant such faith.
I was raised Reform Jewish, until the day of my Bar Mitzvah, when I began viewing all religions as more-or-less cults. Shortly after, I discovered Ayn Rand, and became a typically obnoxious Randroid for many years. I even knew her for a while . . . until she denounced me as being “hopelessly irrational.”
Then, in my mid-30s, I had a rather painful mid-life crisis that resulted in a rethinking of many of my ideas. As far as religion is concerned I call myself a “shrugnostic,” meaning the question of God’s existence is no longer relevant to my life. But in general, I have no idea what my belief system is called, if anything. Probably something like liberal/romantic Hegelian crypto-objectivist existentialism.
I sauntered slowly downward from Catholicism, with a brief look at Protestantism, then flirtation with Wicca, followed by a long period of vague, non-sectarian theism. Then I realized if I looked at things honestly, I was an atheist. This past year I adopted westernized, Tao-flavored Zen Buddhism, which is totally compatible with my continued atheism.
I didn’t answer the poll because I think a lot of people follow the “raised in one religion - become atheist or agnostic - adopt a different religion after 30” pattern. I was raised Presbyterian, spent more than a decade as a hard agnostic, now identify as Zen Buddhist.
I was raised by agnostics leaning towards atheism and am now a Christ follower.