wolfwing Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 What one thing was it that pulled you from Christianity? For me it wasn't anything too glorious or such, though I had my issues. For me it was during a time my own feelings and such were closer to beliefs in nature, and I was bothered by how Christians had such a humanistic view, humans were all that mattered we should focus on us, and when nature and humans colide humans were more important. Not all were that bad but ran into stuff like, "During the time people were wasting money and manpower trying to save whales in the artic, X babies were aborted, X children in africa starved to death." an such that was mentioned at my youth group. Plus the whole idea of animals being just there for us to use, and such. I know not all Christians are this bad, but I found least where I was and with Christians I talked too, there was and still is this sort of feeling that were better then them, and such. There were other things too, like the whole idea of the end times and particularly the rapture always felt like a copout to me, instead of trying to make the world better, god was going to destroy it, and then at the time the world would need Chrsitians the most they get up and leave, back when I believed the BS I used to prey that I get left behind so I could help those stuck in those times, rather then chicken out, though I also sort of hoped it never happen, to me and I still believe this that the world can get better and I would rather try everything then just one day arbitrarily say okay this is it last chance. That was about 15 or so years ago, now more recently in the last two years, been actually researching the bible, and evolution and such and realized just how much BS I was taught and how little I knew about many things. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crazycatlady Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 One day I paused and asked if I actually believed in Jesus Christ and found that the honest answer was no and had been for at least ten years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Praxis_Of_Evil Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 Even in my time as a Christian I was never able to accept the belief that Jesus is the only way to heaven. I refused to believe that good people would suffer in the afterlife just because they had been born into a society with different customs. That kind of made leaving a lot easier. I began questioning more and more in college, with the more I learned and the more I thought about religion, the less probable it seemed. The only thing that kept me in it was that billions of people believed, and how could billions of people all be deceived? I attended some bible studies, and learned that the people there thought the bible was the inerrant word of God, which at that point I refused to accept because I knew it was written by men who inserted their own prejudices under the guise of divine inspiration. The rift in the church over the treatment of homosexuality and my befriending a homosexual both further contributed to my sense of alienation. I had met a gay person, and they weren't horrible monsters like I was told to believe, in fact, I found out that they are normal people who have feelings and deserve respect, and I love my friend very much. To top it all off I grew up in a family that preached abstinence until marriage, despite my near-certainty that this was a lesson my parents themselves had not followed. When finally given the opportunity to engage in sexual activity, I thought for a long time about the fate of my immortal soul. I decided to have sex, I decided that it was not a sin, and I decided that sin was a device of the church. I renounced Jesus that day and renounced God after a couple of weeks of introspection and research into what I had been questioning for so long. I have never looked back, and I never will. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Neon Genesis Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 If there's one thing I can say that pulled me away from Christianity, it was how immoral their god was. I couldn't understand how any morally decent and sane person could worship a god that would send anyone to hell for any reason or what moral justification there was for eternal torture. I couldn't understand why Christians didn't cringe every time they read the OT given how often God slaughtered innocent people. I couldn't understand how people couldn't see through the sexist and homophobic ravings of St. Paul or the barbarism of the crucifixion of Jesus and the whole xtian idea of atonement. Sure, there were a few good gems of positive values found in the bible, but for me it wasn't enough to justify why the majority of the bible was just so barbaric and immoral. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Deva Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 It started with all the bullying I had to take in Jr. High School. I couldn't understand why God would not help me with that. That made me read things about different religions. I couldn't believe if God was good, he would want to be in the Baptist Church I was made to go to. I figured God wasn't present in that place. I think that was the start of it. Later on I couldn't reconcile Noah's ark with scientific findings and it was quite a long road, but eventually I realized Jesus was not real. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mwc Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 It's a long story, more complex that I'm putting here, but ultimately it came down to a prayer that asked for a sign, any sign, and *poof* it was over. No good shepherd left his flock and came for this lost little sheepie. mwc Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big.blue.nation Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 3 Things: * Origins/Content of Scripture (i.e. borrowed mythical stories, astrological significance, character/mean nature of God, etc...) * Early Christian History to Today (i.e. rise of corrupt and oppressive roman catholism, crusades, violence, manipulating scripture, a million different denominations, etc...) * WHERE IS THE EVIDENCE OF GOD IN 2009, here today? He is not relevant to real life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brother Jeff Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 Truth, facts, reason, rational thought, and common sense. It didn't happen overnight, but those things are responsible for my leaving Christianity and then my belief in god behind. Glory! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Andy Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 It was a slow process but ultimately what it came down to for me was a real, unbiased, critical analysis of the Bible and the decision to be honest with myself. I wanted to believe for a long time, but admitting that I just didn't was a big step. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Legion Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 I guess it was a dawning realization of two things about Christianity that compelled me to get away from it. First, most Christians’ response to evolution allowed me to see their denial. And once I spotted this it was easier for me to see other things that they tended to deny. Second, the church’s ludicrous approach to sex allowed me to see their attempts at control. And again, once I spotted this it was easier for me to see how pervasive their reach was. I suppose that if they had only lived in denial and didn’t attempt to oppressively control everyone then I could have tolerated it. And if they hadn’t let denial cloud their wisdom then maybe I could have been more accepting of their guidance. But the combination of both denial and a controlling attitude was intolerable. This, in short, is why I left. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
godlessgrrl Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 There was no one thing. I like to make a point of this, because too many xians seem to act as if there was just One Critical Reason why any apostate left the fold, and if said xian could argue with that One Critical Reason they could just argue you back into the fold. I also like to make a point of it because I've had too many xians think they know what my One Critical Reason was, and have all sorts of critiques and tongue-clucking about how wrong I am to have left because of that One Critical Reason - which reason of course doesn't really exist, but of course they don't want to admit that because A) that would mean they're wrong about me, and that would make their reconversion work so much harder. So really, I had a lot of reasons why I left. It was a process, a long row of people and events and thoughts and whatnot that all snowballed into a gigantic conclusion that xianity was bullshit. Some significant issues: 1) The snowball got rolling in the mid-90's when my grandmother died, and someone told me that she was probably in hell if she hadn't said the right magic words and gotten herself saved. My grandmother was the most loving, caring person in my family; god consigning her to hell on a technicality wasn't consistent with god being a loving deity. That was the first time I questioned anything. 2) Biblical misogyny. As a woman I had a hard time trying to live with a holy book that clearly despised me and my sex. 3) Unspecialness of the Bible when compared with holy texts from around the world. Learn enough religion and mythology, and xianity simply doesn't stand out from the herd in any phenomenally amazing way at all. Yet believers think it does. That didn't make sense. 4) Biblical inconsistencies and the tricky apologetics twisting necessary to reconcile them. 5) Crappy behavior by xians who claimed moral superiority. There were others. I could probably sit down and make a pretty extensive list. Really, though, there wasn't any one particular reason. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woodsmoke Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 Laziness. Sunday mornings are meant to be spent abed, gods damn it. ...Okay, so there was ultimately more to it than that, but I'm being completely honest when I say the whole process started when I decided I just didn't want to bother with going to church one morning. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ryfka Posted March 30, 2009 Share Posted March 30, 2009 For me it was a lot of things but I think it was mostly the hatred that got the ball rolling. I had my first brush with the idea of homosexuality in middle school. I didn't see anything wrong with it (love is love, right?) but Christians in general seemed so vehemently against it. It was also around that time that I started to actually explore the parts of the bible that Sunday school had never talked about. I was shocked by what I found. There was so much violence and hatred and sexism and things I just couldn't bring myself to agree with. I thought, no good and just God would do these things, would he? So yeah. Christians will say, "Read the bible, it'll change your life!" Boy did it change my life. I started to re-think my entire faith, in favor of getting the hell out of there. I started to think about the black and white concepts of Heaven and Hell and realized how much I disliked it. I about all the contradictions. Love your enemy. Kill those bastards because they don't believe in me. Women come second because Eve bit the apple first, even though Adam was stupid enough to follow. Slaughter these people because they don't believe in me. Slaughter their children who never had a chance to believe in me. I love every one of you but if you sneeze too hard I'll throw you in a big firey pit for eternity. I show no evidence of myself besides what I supposedly created and yet you HAVE to believe in me or you're a bad person. I know and see everything, but I couldn't stop Eve from eating an apple, and I can't fix anything for myself without commanding people to run around and kill each other. I thought about all the conflicts that would never happen if "God" weren't in the picture. All the stupidity that could be avoided... In the end I could not see benevolence in God. He was too humanlike. Demanding worship, throwing tantrums, unjustly punishing people who really didn't deserve it... seriously, what a dick. Reminded me more of my school principal than a holy being. Then there was the side dish of all the self-righteousness and hypocrisy and yadda yadda yadda and I decided I just didn't want to be associated with these nutjobs anymore. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vomit Comet Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 It was a long slow process of decline, but the ultimate sledgehammer to the cow's skull was my waking up one morning after having yet another horrible nightmare about my girlfriend being sucked down to hell by demons... ...and deciding that I had to spare her from the madness. So I said "fuck it", said "fuck you" to Jesus and the demons, and finally embraced the several years' worth of accumulated doubt that had eroded my faith to a thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woodsmoke Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 Christians will say, "Read the bible, it'll change your life!" Boy did it change my life. I started to re-think my entire faith, in favor of getting the hell out of there. A post-made-sig from another forum I frequent, re the bible as evidence of god's existence: I consider it more like anti-evidence, like malicious atheists went back in time to write the thing so no one would take the whole "God" idea very seriously at all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brought None Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 My sexual orientation. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Artiss Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 One day I got a letter (mass produced I'm sure) from a cousin that had gone on a missionary trip to Thailand. She was gathering money to go spread the word of god to more heathens and wanted me to chip in for it. The letter then went into this long hoopla about how there were false idols and temples everywhere there, and how sad it was to look around at all the poor misguided people and, specifically, children who were going to burn in hell forever because they didn't know the all powerful Jesus. It hit me like a ton of bricks. How pretentious, self serving, and ego-maniacal the whole shabang was. When I stepped back to ask myself why I was so offended, it became obvious- because I didn't believe and if I had been honest with myself the rational me knew it a long time before the rest of me did. Some helpful Christian threw this awesome tidbit at me ..."So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spit thee out of my mouth." Revelation 3:16. So I spit him out first. And my mouth tastes minty clean now Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest M_H Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 Logical inconsistency after logical inconsistency. I admit, it took too long, but the truth is nothing if not consistent. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Brother Jeff Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 So I spit him out first. And my mouth tastes minty clean now Glory! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vixentrox Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 A lot of things pulled me away but one of the major reasons was the Bible itself. The errors, the barbarity, the abject silliness of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Shion Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 The more research I did the, the more the Bible was proven false and so I left, because I also felt no peace there. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RevOxley_501 Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 I just had to have more from the God I loved so much...I couldn't settle for the God of the bible and whilst trying to reconcile all of those things it just kind of dawned on me...this is all bullshit Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kyle Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 The pain of my divorce started the ball rolling. I was the one who asked for the divorce. It was the most painful, heart-wrenching experience ever. I was married to someone that I could not spend another day with, and I have a daughter that I couldn't bear to be away from. I've never experienced anything as painful. As I came through the grieving process, my eyes were opened and I began to question. The more I questioned, the more I read. The more I read, the more I realized that I don't want to know the god of the babble. I hung on for a while, but I finally broke free and have peace now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
woodsmoke Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 So I spit him out first. And my mouth tastes minty clean now Jesus as mouthwash? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
par4dcourse Posted March 31, 2009 Share Posted March 31, 2009 Logical inconsistency after logical inconsistency. I admit, it took too long, but the truth is nothing if not consistent. Me too. The circular logic used to explain every inconsistency got to me. Example: 1-Gawd is gawd because the wholly babble says so. 2-The wholly babble is the word of gawd because he says so, right there in the wholly babble. WTF??!?!?!!?! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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