I've Been Having A Hard Time Lately

[Internet Jesus]

I've been contemplating physics, the universe and the beyond.

I still seem to have god looming over my imagination.

I feel like I'm in a box.

 

But that there might still be a god and that he's actually testing us.

I know this is bullshit... at least I think I know........

 

How long will it take for me to actually forget religion?

 

My name is Andrew, I was a Christian for twenty years, and I'm still having trouble killing it.

 

Some postulate that we as man formed God after our fathers.

Fathers that left us and as reasonable creatures we can't reason where they went to.

Reason infinity....

[MathGeek]

I don't know, brother. I have been deconverting for almost a month now. I haven't done any kind of deep searching into anything. I'm not really searching out the meaning of it all. I don't think there is any way you can really not think of religion. Since you and I live in the lower 48 states, it's damn impossible to drive down some main street, side street, worn path, unworn path and not a see steeple with an elongated plus sign spiring above it. Try and purge it as one might but the stains of that viral meme I think will be with you in your memory permanently. Even if you cryo-froze yourself and woke up a few hundred years later, if you saw a cross, the memory could come back (with a vengeance even). My suggestion: keep doing what you are doing. Since you have chosen the path least traveled by, you make up your own understanding that will be most meaningful for you and you alone. You are not lost in this boat, there are many others that know your experience and know your kind of pain. My search is ongoing, but I this penchant to get distracted too easily. I denied the veracity of the Bible when I noticed that the laws of mathematics were not listed inside, and some creationist freak called the laws of mathematics "transcendent". There is some "holy" parts there.

 

Welcome aboard, brother x-xtian.

[The-Captain]

We're in the same boat there my friend. About the same time in the cult as well. I think it was our inner fears and bafflement at the size and beauty of our universe that made and what lay beyond our cave fires that created god in the first place. That and everyones general inability to just say I dont know, rather than making up gods and reasons for everything.

 

Heres a useless aphorism for you about memory; nothing that happens is ever truly forgotten (at least to you personally). Whatever "wounds" we had from xianity are still going to be there. But scars remind us of where weve been and why we wont get hurt like that again.

 

I get alot of those little paranoid thoughts about god too (especially where all that apocalypse stuff is concerned), partly b/c our religion indoctrinated us with a lot of tripe about our doubts being either satan or our own sin nature getting in the way of god. All that stuff about god making the wisdom of the age foolishness, blinding the eyes of sinners etc all amounts to a bunch of anti-intellectual propaganda to cow possible doubters and questioners. When those nagging doubts crop up I just remember how akin they are to my childhood fear of terrible things hiding under the bed/in the attic/outside the window just waiting for me to stop believing in them before they strike.

 

And of course just look at all them old codgers on the site! Alot of them have certainly gotten over their god fears, and I certainly think we can.

[GraphicsGuy]

I think it's pretty normal to break the hold religion has on your life. Really, it's a path of learning who you are without that religion. Breaking habits, dumping dogma. It's a long, long process. I don't think it's possible to dump it all in a day.

 

Hang in there. You'll make it!

[Hammurabi]

Hey Internet Jesus, I can relate. I was 21 when I deconverted after a long time of fading faith. At first it really tore at me, everything I did, everyone I knew and everything I thought about the world was all inseperable from my former religion. It really put me into a dark place. I was fortunate at the time to have a very cool, very smart roommate (getting his PhD in theoretical physics, none the less) who was a friendly ear and turned me on to some cool books. I felt like I was losing my mind, like I couldn't even tell what I really thought anymore and having someone to listen and tell me when I was full of shit and when I was on the right path went a long way towards helping me sort out what I really thought of the world. My advice to you is to use this board, and speak with any non-religious friends you have(if any) often. Just getting your thoughts out into the real world and giving yourself a chance to examine them does wonders.

 

The process of deconverting takes time, you have 20 years of backwards and sometimes malevolent thinking to overcome. But I can assure you that given time and a steady diet of reason and skepticism, there will be a day where the idea of appealing to a higher power is as foreign as appealing to science and reason used to be.

[bellsybop]

From my personal experience, I realized I made it through when I got mad.

 

We've all been told what to think and also what to fear.

 

It was brainwashing. Once you can make peace with the idea that we've been

brainwashed, you'll feel a whole lot better. I looked up tons of things on the

internet and read books. My favorite was The Age of Reason. There's an English

version of it on another site. Take your time, but please don't let fear be the reason

why you struggle. Start by finding out the history of the bible and how it was put

together. Check into the Inquisitions. Read Thomas Paine's book. But take your time.

Don't just skim them. And for goodness sake..... QUESTION everything.

[Fweethawt]

My name is Andrew, I was a Christian for twenty years, and I'm still having trouble killing it.

My name is Fwee, and I think you're doin' fine for someone who was in it for twenty years. The death of it comes with time. There's no other way around that... You'll get there.

[R. S. Martin]

I've been contemplating physics, the universe and the beyond.

I still seem to have god looming over my imagination.

I feel like I'm in a box.

 

But that there might still be a god and that he's actually testing us.

I know this is bullshit... at least I think I know........

 

How long will it take for me to actually forget religion?

 

My name is Andrew, I was a Christian for twenty years, and I'm still having trouble killing it.

 

I don't think you kill it. I think you grow out of it.

 

I'm really strong on self-analysis. You feel like god is looming over you. Can you take a look at god and examine what he actually looks like? Who or what is this entity really? Analyze it. Paint it. Describe it in writing. Whatever works for you. If visual descriptions don't work, does it work to describe the feelings you get when god "looms" over you? Boy, I can just feel the suffocating doom of a controling parent in that. Or maybe it's some other association or fear that was a very real part of your early life.

 

This type of analyzing or describing our impressions can give us a sense of control. It can help us integrate the stuff into our lives so that it loses its control over us. As someone said, the scars and memories will remain. We have to find ways to live with them. This is one of the ways--by integrating them in ways that they no longer control us.

 

Do the same with the box, the thing that traps you and keeps you from growing and expanding your life and spreading your wings.

 

Then, as a reward, feast on the pleasure of your new-found freedom and analyze it, too. Absorb how it feels to be free to be YOU--wthout any guilt. Or whatever feels positive. These are ways to nurture your Self. As you nurture yourself, you nurture others. Until and unless we nurture and love ourselves we cannot love and nurture others. Why? Because we have nothing and are nothing. But if we love and nurture ourselves we grow and become ourselves. When we are ourselves we can give of ourselves. It's just the way things work naturally; we don't have to try. The only thing we have to try is to be true to our Selves--not selfishly or in ways that hurts anyone, but in healthy ways. Ways that are healthy for ourselves and others.

[Internet Jesus]

I think it's pretty normal to break the hold religion has on your life. Really, it's a path of learning who you are without that religion. Breaking habits, dumping dogma. It's a long, long process. I don't think it's possible to dump it all in a day.

 

Hang in there. You'll make it!

 

 

But it's been like two years...

 

[i wasn't an Xtian for 20, more like 18.]

 

I find it all terribly repulsive.

And strangely alluring.

[Internet Jesus]

We're in the same boat there my friend. About the same time in the cult as well. I think it was our inner fears and bafflement at the size and beauty of our universe that made and what lay beyond our cave fires that created god in the first place. That and everyones general inability to just say I dont know, rather than making up gods and reasons for everything.

 

Heres a useless aphorism for you about memory; nothing that happens is ever truly forgotten (at least to you personally). Whatever "wounds" we had from xianity are still going to be there. But scars remind us of where weve been and why we wont get hurt like that again.

 

I get alot of those little paranoid thoughts about god too (especially where all that apocalypse stuff is concerned), partly b/c our religion indoctrinated us with a lot of tripe about our doubts being either satan or our own sin nature getting in the way of god. All that stuff about god making the wisdom of the age foolishness, blinding the eyes of sinners etc all amounts to a bunch of anti-intellectual propaganda to cow possible doubters and questioners. When those nagging doubts crop up I just remember how akin they are to my childhood fear of terrible things hiding under the bed/in the attic/outside the window just waiting for me to stop believing in them before they strike.

 

And of course just look at all them old codgers on the site! Alot of them have certainly gotten over their god fears, and I certainly think we can.

 

I think believing in God puts each human at the center of the universe.

It makes every person feel cosmically loved.

The universe is a cold cold thing without silly notions.

[Internet Jesus]

From my personal experience, I realized I made it through when I got mad.

 

We've all been told what to think and also what to fear.

 

It was brainwashing. Once you can make peace with the idea that we've been

brainwashed, you'll feel a whole lot better. I looked up tons of things on the

internet and read books. My favorite was The Age of Reason. There's an English

version of it on another site. Take your time, but please don't let fear be the reason

why you struggle. Start by finding out the history of the bible and how it was put

together. Check into the Inquisitions. Read Thomas Paine's book. But take your time.

Don't just skim them. And for goodness sake..... QUESTION everything.

 

 

I've been reading. I dumped it all, and then asked myself critically "Is there a God?"

 

I think another way of phrasing that question would be "Am I finite or am I infinite?"

 

Although saying there is no God, therefore when you die nothing happens, is very limiting.

 

We've only been able to explain the properties of this realm, to put chains on what realm there may be afterward is sad.

[The-Captain]

I've been reading. I dumped it all, and then asked myself critically "Is there a God?"

 

I think another way of phrasing that question would be "Am I finite or am I infinite?"

 

Although saying there is no God, therefore when you die nothing happens, is very limiting.

 

We've only been able to explain the properties of this realm, to put chains on what realm there may be afterward is sad.

 

Yeah who knows what happens, ever read Xenocide, Children of the Mind, or Speaker for the Dead? They may be sci-fi but Orson Scott Card puts forth an interesting idea of a seperate universe outside of ours where our "souls" so to speak come from before entering the material universe. Anyway bears some thought the idea that perhaps there are things outside of real space.

[florduh]

We're in the same boat there my friend. About the same time in the cult as well. I think it was our inner fears and bafflement at the size and beauty of our universe that made and what lay beyond our cave fires that created god in the first place. That and everyones general inability to just say I dont know, rather than making up gods and reasons for everything.

 

Heres a useless aphorism for you about memory; nothing that happens is ever truly forgotten (at least to you personally). Whatever "wounds" we had from xianity are still going to be there. But scars remind us of where weve been and why we wont get hurt like that again.

 

I get alot of those little paranoid thoughts about god too (especially where all that apocalypse stuff is concerned), partly b/c our religion indoctrinated us with a lot of tripe about our doubts being either satan or our own sin nature getting in the way of god. All that stuff about god making the wisdom of the age foolishness, blinding the eyes of sinners etc all amounts to a bunch of anti-intellectual propaganda to cow possible doubters and questioners. When those nagging doubts crop up I just remember how akin they are to my childhood fear of terrible things hiding under the bed/in the attic/outside the window just waiting for me to stop believing in them before they strike.

 

And of course just look at all them old codgers on the site! Alot of them have certainly gotten over their god fears, and I certainly think we can.

 

Yep. Take it from an old codger. You WILL get better.

 

- Chris

[cm_christ]

i went through this same thing, after de-converting and re-arming withng science i had to face my own mortallity finally, but i'm not gonna sit around and worry about dying because i keep busy and remind myself how much more of this world there is. worst case scenario if you get really depressed when faced with your own mortality, put on your favorite song, the one that always makes you smile (the trooper?) and appreciate how there can be no true joy without end. best of luck my fellow ex-christian

[Guest JayA]

it takes a bit of time to get the thought process turned around... it took me almost a year to get it together.

[Aqua Kitty]

I think believing in God puts each human at the center of the universe.

It makes every person feel cosmically loved.

The universe is a cold cold thing without silly notions.

 

Having no god still leaves each human at the center of the universe. Probably even more so than before. We are the ones who give the universe meaning. There would be no concept of cosmic love without us feeling that love deep within us. The universe is an even more beautiful place without the silly notions.

[ShackledNoMore]

But that there might still be a god and that he's actually testing us.

I know this is bullshit... at least I think I know........

That idea hung around for me for quite awhile too.

 

Let's assume that it was true:

 

In that case, god would have had to have masterminded a very elaborate ruse for the purposes of testing us. Through his omnipotence he would have to have hidden layer after layer of misdirection that we humans would keep uncovering as our history progressed that smacked in the face of science and empirical evidence. He would have had to have hidden traces of eons of earlier life. He would have had to have faked the geological record. He would have needed to have rigged proven dating records. He would have had to have tampered with the speed of light and the apparent age of the universe. He would have to had, in effect, create the universe in a state where it would be exactly if it had already existed (AND evolved) for billions of years. The flood itself would have been barely worth mentioning compared with the magic he would have needed to use to get the ark populated from species around the world, make everything fit, keep everything alive, magically cause the ark to survive the deluge, summon the water, get rid of the water, reestablish a robust worldwide ecosystem almost immediately, and not leave traces of the worldwide flood (carefully destroying all evidence AGAIN even though the world was already created and populated, so that he could test our faith).

 

Like you, I held out doubt while I was deconverting (and lingering for a time period after) that yes, he may have actually gone to all this trouble to test our faith.

 

But there's more... He would have needed to directly inspire the bible to be vague and contradictory. He would have left us to grapple with why certain attributes assigned to humanity actually seemed to be culturally defined. We'd have to figure out why many of these cultures we only really had contact with within the past few hundred years were not ashamed of their nakedness because of original sin. We'd have to figure out why it was not obvious that he was the true god to people who had never heard of xianity, and why they continued to think their false gods were the true gods after they had heard about xianity, at least in cases where his followers did not shed blood to win converts. In his omnipotence, he would have directed by his hand different accounts of the same events in the gospels. With only his followers' message that he was perfect, he would have sculpted a manual that apologists jumped through hoops to defend for millenia. He would have deliberately created a manual that was so unclear that his own followers would debate for centuries, each defending their own interpretations, frequently alleging that those others who called themselves xians but interpreted things differently from them would burn in hell, and sometimes killing each other over their disagreements. He would have masterminded it to appear that the divinely inspired way in which his book was assembled was anything but divinely inspired. He would also be heavily biased against those who lived in times when science flourished such as now. For some reason, he would not have been interested in testing the faith of primitives, for whom his explanations would have seemed a lot more plausible--he didn't even bother to hide from them. He would have had to save his real tests for those of us who lived today.

 

Ultimately he would have left enough vague, inconsistent, and contradictory that by careful examination, we could legitimately conclude that the claims of xianity are NOT true. He would have had to muddle with our minds, tinker with our sanity and leave us actively deceived and essentially insane in order to test our faith.

 

He would have to had valued blind gullibility in his followers, but only gullibility for the claims he so dubiously left us to follow. He would only wanted to save followers, who by sheer chance, were lucky enough to be gullible to his claims and not competing claims.

 

I realize, however, that some would claim that the bible is not to be taken literally.

 

Let's assume that that's the case:

 

Then god would have left us with an impossible task to pick and choose what is of value in his manual. We'd need our own psychic magic to know what he's serious about and what he wasn't. He'd leave us scratching our heads why he has such a problem with homosexuals, neighboring tribes, and people who work on the sabbath, and why he had NO problem with slavery and endorsed it. He'd leave us scratching our head why he put all this in his bible if we were supposed to ignore it and only latch on to the nice stuff. And he'd leave us scratching our head trying to reconcile all this with how his religion was the truth and other religions were false. We'd have no way of knowing whether we would go to hell or not, or even if there was a hell, and he'd know that he left us with no basis of knowing this, or knowing how much of his bible to embrace, and he'd know that he left us with no basis to determine that a non-literal interpretation of his bible as opposed to selecting another religion or no religion was correct.

 

At some point, after a year or two or five or ten of critical thought, one sees the xian god as every bit as much of a pure mythological figure as zeus.

[Kenny]

But that there might still be a god and that he's actually testing us.

I know this is bullshit... at least I think I know........

That idea hung around for me for quite awhile too.

 

Let's assume that it was true:

 

In that case...

 

EVERY WORD YOU SAID.

 

 

Fantastic! Thank you for taking the time to post that. Very clear and concise. What you wrote made absolute sense. Helped me out, for sure...

[mwc]

But it's been like two years...

 

[i wasn't an Xtian for 20, more like 18.]

 

I find it all terribly repulsive.

And strangely alluring.

I was in for over 30. Been out for awhile longer than you (been here since 2005 from the fall-out). I still have a few sore spots to work out. It can't be said enough...time (I wish I could tell you exactly how much but you'll know it when you get there).

 

mwc

[Grandpa Harley]

I think believing in God puts each human at the center of the universe.

It makes every person feel cosmically loved.

The universe is a cold cold thing without silly notions.

 

Even as a small child, I knew where infinity ends.

I sit at it.

Where I am

Is warm, dry, and contains everything I value.

I have a full scale universe to play with

And it's far from a cold place.

 

(since blank verse seems to be the order of the day... and don't make me quote G'Kar at you...)

[R. S. Martin]

I think believing in God puts each human at the center of the universe.

It makes every person feel cosmically loved.

The universe is a cold cold thing without silly notions.

 

Even as a small child, I knew where infinity ends.

I sit at it.

Where I am

Is warm, dry, and contains everything I value.

I have a full scale universe to play with

And it's far from a cold place.

 

(since blank verse seems to be the order of the day... and don't make me quote G'Kar at you...)

 

That was excellent, Gramps! No need to apologize. I was getting right down there with you in the warm sunny spot on the cement. Of course, it was right outside the side door of the old farmhouse where I was a child but isn't that the secret of this kind of poetry?