Guest dragonfly310 Posted January 4, 2009 Share Posted January 4, 2009 I seem to be in this habit of reminding my husband not to underestimate the intelligence/logical capabilities of a child, especially our 9 year old daughter. (snicker). I say that because not only does she have good conversations with her daddy, she can also make me think. She's the one that got me thinking again. Three years ago, my husband's grandmother passed away. My daughter was quite close to her great grandma, so of course she was upset about it. So, we told her the typical Christian mantra: "It's okay, sweetheart. We know you miss her, but she's in a better place now. She's not sick anymore. She with God in heaven. Blah, blah, blah." Well, my daughter is not the type that can just let things go. She doesn't obsess over things to the point it disrupts her life, but there are still occasions where she still thinks of her beloved grandma and starts to miss her again. Sometimes, even three years after the fact, she does feel the pain again as if it happened yesterday. We started to hear things from her like, "I wanna die," and "I wanna be with God." Every time she'd blurt something like this, I'd ask her why. I knew she was missing Mawmaw again, but I did want her to know that she could express it, but only when she was ready. She finally did express exactly why she wanted to die one evening. She wanted to die to go to her grandma. She wanted to go to that same place. She knew how to get there. She had to die to do it, and she thought she was willing to do just that. Of course, my husband and I attempted to correct this notion of death being desirable. She's not really suicidal; she just didn't understand what she was really saying/thinking. Remember, she is only 9 years old. At the same time, she did get me thinking about how Christianity makes people wish for their death. Christians do seem to pray for their own death (that better place, the "rapture", etc.). They wish this "tribulation" on others they disagree with. They advocate the death penalty (which I find ironic, since they're wishing that "better place" for those that have committed heinous crimes and have converted in prison while wanting to go their themselves) and they have no problem killing innocent civilians during an illegal war while stating that a mass of cells is more important than a child already breathing and screaming in pain. Well, one question always leads to another, and another, and another. I find myself asking the same questions I did as a child and teenager. I also remember being told I was too ignorant/stupid to understand as their answer to those questions. Deep down, I know there is no god. While I am far from the most educated person in science and math, I know a lot of the answers can be found there. But, I'm finding that is is hard to let go of something that I've held on to for so long. It's not that I fear losing the community that you get once you "get saved." I never had that. I have too weird of a personality for that. You can't miss what you never had. It's not that I fear/dread what my friends and family will think. I don't give a damn because none of my friends are church buddies, and my family, well, they can jump off a cliff for all I care. I've already pissed them off by just being me and not doing with my life what they think I should do. I did what I wanted to do, and what was best for me to do. So what is it I fear? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Super Moderator florduh Posted January 4, 2009 Super Moderator Share Posted January 4, 2009 Welcome, dragonfly. What you fear is probably what many fear at first - what if I missed something and they are right? I will surely go to the Hell they described. If you educate yourself more on the cult and the discrepancies and odd history of the Bible they are using today, you will feel more secure in what you already intellectually know to be true. It takes a little time for most people to get comfortable with reality. Christianity uses fear as a primary tool for control. Best of luck to you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest dragonfly310 Posted January 4, 2009 Share Posted January 4, 2009 heh heh yeah. I am kinda new to this new way of thinking. I am a wife and mother, so it's not like I have entire days at my disposal to do as you suggested quickly. But, I will do it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
noob Posted January 5, 2009 Share Posted January 5, 2009 Welcome, dragonfly! I raised my nephew and when he was a teenager, his interest in world religions triggered some of my initial questioning. Aren't kids great? You made me laugh when you said you have too weird of a personality to feel the lack of community. Hmmmm... I suspect you have a lot of company here! Enjoy the forums and I look forward to hearing more from you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
pitchu Posted January 5, 2009 Share Posted January 5, 2009 Welcome to the forums, dragonfly. It is spectacular, isn't it, that Christians think they're leading a right and loving life by following a religion premised on human sacrifice and which glorifies death in the most obscene ways? Smart kid you got. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest dragonfly310 Posted January 5, 2009 Share Posted January 5, 2009 Thank you guys/gals for responding to my thread. I'm not dumb enough to loudly announce my new found lack of beliefs to everyone I know, but I felt like I needed to say it to someone, somewhere. So, thank you for that allowance. All I wrote in that very first post of mine was just where I was yesterday. I don't know what triggered the memories, but it seemed to come at me all at once. I have all these thoughts and previous unanswered questions that I've struggled with running through my head at the moment. It seems like it's yet another one of those things that I had right the first time, before I got caught up in wanting to please everyone else and not having the intestinal fortitude to say, "Hey, wait a minute. That doesn't sound right." There have been many of those I've noticed in the past year... UGH!!! Damn my new year's resolution of being totally honest with myself. I fear it's only going to get worse, but I also feel it's for my betterment. This may not make a lick of sense to you, but one of my biggest question sequences about a major premise of Christianity is: Why did God have to sacrifice his own son in order to save us from our sins? Why did we need saving anyway? What is it about the sacrifice that made everything ok with God? What is it about God and his righteousness that requires two wrongs to make a right? And then I read about "turn the other cheek" and I couldn't wrap my mind around a god that doesn't practice what he preaches. So much for the righteousness of God. It became easier once I could swallow my pride and admit that it didn't make sense. The pride swallowing and admission was the hardest part. How could I have been that enamored with this crap to allow myself to believe double think? Ugh, what I did to myself just to fit into this weird (to me now, anyway) social class I married into. Off topic: Yes, I do make up words (like betterment), but I'm not that off the wall all the time. I just reread my first post in this thread and found a misspelled/misused word. I will admit to a lot of cognitive dissonance because of my devotion to Christianity, but I do know how to use the words there, their, and they're. I'd edit that misuse of that word in that post, but I do not have edit privileges yet. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tealeaf Posted January 9, 2009 Share Posted January 9, 2009 Ah, the dangers of religion making themselves very clear again. As I always propose to any believer: If you truly believe you're going to everlasting paradise when you die, why don't you kill yourself right now?? Better yet, if you kill yourself at age 9....you haven't even had enough time to do anything really wrong! Heaven for sure! The heaven complex is what leads people to blow up buses as well. It is child abuse to actually tell a child when they die, all will be well, I think. I was always fully aware that when I die, I rot in the ground. End of story. This of course, makes me want to remain alive that much more. dragonfly, keep questioning and probing. Religion needs to be spoken against. And if your daughter wonders about death, I'd say tell her the truth. Tell her why living life is so important. It's all she's got. She's the lucky one. One in literally millions of potential children that were not born. That's all the reason I need to keep on living. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest dragonfly310 Posted January 14, 2009 Share Posted January 14, 2009 Tealeaf, I was forced to do exactly what you advised in your last paragraph. I could not have a suicidal 9 year old, especially one based on the idea that heaven is this better place and she'll meet up with her beloved grandma. She indeed woke me up to my own childhood thoughts. I too felt the same starting as a young child, and it messed up my life royally. I not want my sweetheart to go thought what I did up until a few months ago. It's a depressing world.... It's the heaven concept that makes (some) people suicidal/murderous. It's the hell concept that keeps people within the mindset even after the logic of heaven fails. :/ Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest QuidEstCaritas? Posted January 14, 2009 Share Posted January 14, 2009 Tealeaf, I was forced to do exactly what you advised in your last paragraph. I could not have a suicidal 9 year old, especially one based on the idea that heaven is this better place and she'll meet up with her beloved grandma. She indeed woke me up to my own childhood thoughts. I too felt the same starting as a young child, and it messed up my life royally. I not want my sweetheart to go thought what I did up until a few months ago. It's a depressing world.... It's the heaven concept that makes (some) people suicidal/murderous. It's the hell concept that keeps people within the mindset even after the logic of heaven fails. :/ Hell must have come in pretty handy around the time of Constantine... It must have been an easy way back then for the government to offload responsibility onto the hands of the priesthood with the knowledge that people were going to be predictable as a result of belief in the mindgames of heaven and hell. Like Hubbard's blue sky, but an older version. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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