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Goodbye Jesus

Deconverting Or Not


TheHappyWarrior

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My experience with the Christian religion has at the same time been rather unusual and extremely conventional. I was born and raised in Southern California to a Christian father and a Buddhist mother, both of whom are of Korean descent. I do not believe I went to church in my earliest years (certainly I was not baptized) although I learned a couple of Bible stories through picture books and the like. I began attending Korean school and children's services when I was around 6 at my father's church but after a few weeks refused to attend the latter due to me being afraid of hearing certain Bible accounts (especially the Flood). My parents were unusually tolerant of this and did not mind as I came to be in an unusual situation where I would attend Korean school at my church but then for the rest of the day go to some unused room with my mother or have my dad drive me to a bookstore. My religious beliefs during this period may best be described as childish atheism-I saw nothing of God so why should I believe in Him? I must note that my childhood was not normal-I have Asperger's and as a result I did not get along very with any children my age whether in church or school. Starting at around age 9, I began to reconsider this simplistic atheism and instead developed the opinion there may be a Higher Power. Undoubtedly due to my surroundings, the religion I became most favourable to was Christianity. By sixth grade I expressed a desire to be baptized and begin attending services (the latter of which I did not do because I found it awkward to suddenly start attending services). The following year I managed to come across Jack Chick's comics (through an online forum thread mocking his cartoons) which introduced me to the whole sola fide concept and Herbert Armstrong's extremely Judaic form of pseudo-Christianity (which I was almost convinced by intellectually but never followed on since I liked a lot of non-Kosher foods). Eighth grade (hard to believe its been a half a decade since then) was the big year for me as our old church (which was Korean Presbyterian) had suffered a split and our family moved to the new church. There I could start attending services without it being awkward. Additionally I came across John MacArthur and through him Calvinist theology. It seemed so logical to me, that it became my default form of Christian theology although my understanding of it was very superficial as I just gleaned and skimmed webpages since during that time I had an odd disability (which still plagues me although more rarely thank God) where I could not progress past a certain line in a text so I rarely read through articles. During this time I began to wonder whether I was saved since I couldn't remember the moment I decided to believe that Jesus had died for my sins. I rested upon a vaguely remembered prayer I had uttered in sixth grade, but it seemed very doubtful. During the summer of 2010, these matters came to a head as I became convinced I was still unconverted and prayed for salvation on multiple occasions, usually in front of my mother. Additionally I was plagued by fears that a certain "more Calvinist than Calvin" theology propounded by Marc Carpenter of Outside the Camp might be true. It was then I first came across Deism and Colonel Ingersoll's agnosticism, which seemed to offer a hopeful escape. However, eventually with high school starting, I abandoned these inklings and was instead satisfied I had been saved. This was despite the fact that I often engaged in hypocritical behaviour in my freshman year of high school (such as writing ridiculously obscene stories in imitation of Marquis De Sade). My freshman and sophomore years were thus spent quite uncritically-going to church and occasionally getting into theological discussions but otherwise not doing anything particularly Christian such as praying or Bible reading.

 

Doubts about my salvation returned at the end of my sophomore year as the time I had come for me to be baptized and confirmed. There were some spiritual struggles during this season, especially after I went to my first Christian retreat in the summer of 2012, but in the end I was quietly baptized and confirmed in the Sunday before Christmas. Since up to that point in time, I had never engaged in a thorough reading of any book of the Bible (although I'd tried a few times) I decided to begin reading through the Bible in the summer of 2013. For the third time, doubts about my salvation had returned, this time far more detailed and thorough by making me wonder I'd properly repented and lived a life consistent with Christian teaching. I listened to a couple of sermons such as those of Paul Washer who emphasized this point very strongly. I also began to peruse some of the writings of the extremely fundamentalist Independent Baptist (which I had before but not very seriously) and feared that some of their ultra-dogmatic and strict teaching against for example women wearing pants or fellowshipping with any Christians who aren't fundamentalist Independent Baptists might be true. This fear led me to reach out and explore the writings of Robert Ingersoll once more. Immediately I found the "Great Agnostic" to be resonant with my own thinking as he derided the cruelty of much of the Bible and outlined his own liberal and humanitarian views which included among other things abolition of slavery, women's rights, and opposition to Chinese exclusion. In this could not help but noting it was this infidel who had stood ahead of the morals of his times. At the same time, I began to follow the blogs of the ex-Christian Bruce Gerencser but also began to examine the Christian responses to sceptical/secularist claims especially atheists or other sceptics who had become converted to Christianity. It was at this juncture I began to consider myself first an atheist and then an agnodeist (with an extremely indifferent deity) as I began to think that if Christianity and the Bible were true than the cosmos was truly a horror. For since 1) Scripture appears to teach anybody who is not a true Christian will be punished eternally in Hell and 2) the majority of the world's population is not even nominally Christian (and Scripture places a far stricter demand on believers); the vast majority of humanity would be punished eternally and thus their suffering would exceed the bliss of the saved in Heaven. Thus it seemed to me that it was far more moral to have a cosmos where all would meet the same fate of eternal sleep than a cosmos of infinite agony. Of course there were also the objections over God's temporal commands to slaughter various enemies of Israel and the New Testament teachings demanding blind submission of slaves and subjects of tyrants. These were teachings I could not accept and thus I began to actively fear the fact that Christianity might after all be true. 

 

This is roughly where I have stood for the last couple of months. In front of most people (both personally and online) I state I am a Christian and go through the motions of faith whenever needed. I continued going to my old church regularly until I left for Massachusetts last month and since my arrival here have gone to a Mass once along with attending a Catholic retreat. It must be noted a "bad experience" with my church was in no way a factor in my deconversion. My church while broadly evangelical was quite moderate in practice and tone-very rarely was Hell mentioned, most kids went to public school, nobody cared what music or movies one watched-and full of some of the kindest, most intelligent, and sincere people I've met. It was rather the seeming realization that it was the moderation of my church that was inconsistent with Scripture that was a key factor in my loss of faith. Currently I am in a constantly anxious state over whether Christianity might not be true after all. In particular the seemingly extreme transformations undergone by former scoffers such as the evolutionary biologist turned Young Earth Creationist Dr. Richard Lumsden (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4dMHZior9TE) or the Marxist history teacher turned modern-day OT prophet Art Katz (whose testimony can be found here: http://www.theocraticfaith.com/wp-content/plugins/downloads-manager/upload/Ben%20Israel.pdf) that worry and anguish me-what if Christianity really is true and thus I became converted like these men to an extreme fundamentalist position that propounds young earth creationism and agrees on the necessity of submission?. I come here in the hopes of finding people who will be able to listen, understand, and engage with me on my testimony. 

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Great post and it totally clicks with me. Christianity is horror and totally unlovable. Its complete lack of feedback as to whether you are saved or not (from God, by God) is one of its nastiest aspects.  A God that demands a relationship with you, while playing hide and seek is bizarre 

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To Add:

 

I love the writings of Ingersoll, he is my favourite author by far

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Thanks for sharing and welcome to ExC.

 

Just read the boards here, and you'll get plenty of info to let you know the Bible isn't true. If there's a particular issue you're interested in, you could start a thread about it. I can tell you it's not true--take a look at the book of Genesis without god glasses on, that should help. We've got magic fruit, talking snakes, Cain's wife came from where? I mean really think about it. We've got a genocidal God who requires dead animals, and then his own self to die as sacrifice. There are so many issues you won't believe how you ever believed it at all when you're done with it.

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Welcome to Ex-C, TheHappyWarrior.  I recommend reading John Loftus and Bart Ehrman in order to gain a realistic perspective on the bible.  Good luck on your journey!

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Welcome to Ex-C, TheHappyWarrior.  I recommend reading John Loftus and Bart Ehrman in order to gain a realistic perspective on the bible.  Good luck on your journey!

 

Thanks for the welcome. I've been meaning to read both Loftus and Ehrman along with Richard Carrier's book on the historicity of Jesus.

 

Great post and it totally clicks with me. Christianity is horror and totally unlovable. Its complete lack of feedback as to whether you are saved or not (from God, by God) is one of its nastiest aspects.  A God that demands a relationship with you, while playing hide and seek is bizarre 

 

Thank you for the compliment! It is true that there is no real "feedback" mechanism in Christianity-only subjective criteria based on personal holiness and enthusiasm.

TheHappyWarrior,

 

Greetings and welcome to ex-c forums. Thanks for sharing your story. I appreciate the challenging road you have been traveling. I hope you will find encouragement and insight on these forums, to help clarify the issues for you. The questions you have, many of us have also wrestled with. If you haven't done so already, you might read other testimonials and find some inspiration in them. Keep asking questions and reaching out for support. Many people here will be glad to help.

 

Peace,

Human

 

Thank you for responding. Having joined a few months ago I've already checked out a few threads and intend to read more. 

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Welcome.

 

Sorting out your head when it's been infected with the Christian virus tends to be a difficult and often log drawn out experience.  There are plenty here who will be ready with advice and encouragement - just shout.

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Two questions:

 

1) Are there deconverts here who originally started as fairly knowledgable atheists who became converted rather than people raised in a Christian background and/or simply did not thought much about religion?

 

2) Are there deconverts here who have been "reconverted"? 

 

Again thank you for the encouragement. 

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welcome to reality. I dont know if there are any on the board here but there are lots of people online who say they started as atheists and became christian the most popular probably being kirk cameron. Its my opinion that christians often conflate religious apathy and atheism so I would bet money that the number of true atheists turned christian is lower than whats reported. 

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It would seem that faith and doubt are necessary bed-fellows; they go hand-in-hand.  One cannot have faith without also having doubts.  The attempt to believe something incredibly extra-ordinary without so much as a scrap of evidence, or even the means to obtain any evidence, will always leave the believer with nagging doubts. 

 

Those who seem the most convinced are often secretly the most doubtful; just as those who give the most hugs are often the ones most in need of them.

 

Those who can overcome their doubts, those who can ignore their questions--they remain believers.  Those who cannot, deconvert.

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