Dagan Posted November 2, 2010 Posted November 2, 2010 Found this letter I wrote to one of my church elder friends about six months before I deconverted. This letter was written Sept. 2007. I never mailed it though... I sucked it up and tried to make it all work. At this point I was heavily involved in church work and honestly wanted to live the Christian life. See if you can spot the warning signs... ...if I wanted to, I could systematically destroy every single thread that makes up the tapestry of my faith with a few simple questions, facts and arguments. It's actually quite easy. It would be painful to tear apart the thing that has shaped me since I was a child -- my Christian faith -- but at this point I see no reason not to. I might actually be happier as an end result. My faith is weak, and my past three-four years in this church have contributed to that. I am less willing to take things on faith than I once was and I am wondering if I need any faith at all, because it hasn't seem to make much difference. Why does God, who apparently created everything and takes delight in his creation, choose to hide himself, forcing his creation to be content with faith? When I play hide-and-seek with my daughter, it's my greatest joy to have her find me, and to give her a great big hug and laugh together when she does. Why does God want us to constantly chase him, leaving us to be content with half-imagined glimpses from the corners of our eyes? I don't understand. Why do none of my prayers ever seem to be answered? In my times of doubt, why does God not reveal himself to me in a way that answers my painful, soul-searching questions? It always comes down to me having to make the choice to believe, and I don't see much point in making that choice anymore. Life is the same, with or without God. At least without God I know that when something bad happens, it's not some test he sent. It's something to overcome, to apologize for, or to forgive someone for, and then get on with life. And without God, everything we do takes on more importance because this is it. There is no afterlife to give us a second chance. I have had moments of joy in the past few years, experiences that filled me up with happiness and made me feel excited and enthusiastic about life. I also felt inspired to do God's work, but once I got into the roller coaster of joy and misery which apparently makes up the Christian life, I found myself asking if there's anything more. Die, and go to eternal glory, is apparently the answer. Hardly comforting when you feel like you've been sentenced to life imprisonment in a way of life that promotes manic-depressive cycles of misery as normal.
foolish girl Posted November 2, 2010 Posted November 2, 2010 Hey JAbbr, Thank you for sharing this. I can hear the heartache and struggle. It also sounds like you had already made up your mind, you were just afraid to admit it- which is evidenced by having never mailed this. I Liked the hide and seek metaphor, I can identify with it as a Mama and an Atheist. I keep meaning to write a "Why I am not a 'believer' " letter, with links to important information and illustrations. I need to get to that! See you round, Wokky.
Dagan Posted November 3, 2010 Author Posted November 3, 2010 Thanks FG. I think I must have made up my mind when I wrote this, at least on a subconscious level. I just couldn't face it until six months later. Let me know when you write that letter, I'd love to read it.
foolish girl Posted November 3, 2010 Posted November 3, 2010 k, I will My real hold-up is that I need to buy Word for my PC. Right now anytime I need to make a doc, I have to use husbands PC. Your letter inspired me though. I keep losing track of the need to write it all down, but I think that it is important to organize it all.
Guest I Love Dog Posted November 3, 2010 Posted November 3, 2010 k, I will My real hold-up is that I need to buy Word for my PC. Right now anytime I need to make a doc, I have to use husbands PC. Your letter inspired me though. I keep losing track of the need to write it all down, but I think that it is important to organize it all. No need to by MS Word! Open Office is FREE and opens all Word docs. It's a great prog. http://www.openoffice.org/
foolish girl Posted November 4, 2010 Posted November 4, 2010 k, I will My real hold-up is that I need to buy Word for my PC. Right now anytime I need to make a doc, I have to use husbands PC. Your letter inspired me though. I keep losing track of the need to write it all down, but I think that it is important to organize it all. No need to by MS Word! Open Office is FREE and opens all Word docs. It's a great prog. http://www.openoffice.org/ Wow, Dog! I just downloaded it and I am about to open it up and giver her a whirl. I have a paper and a 'powerpoint' to make this week for school, so hopefully- this will work! Thank you so much
Dagan Posted November 4, 2010 Author Posted November 4, 2010 Thanks for linking that Dog I was gonna suggest it too. Open Office is great!
Guest Valk0010 Posted November 5, 2010 Posted November 5, 2010 k, I will My real hold-up is that I need to buy Word for my PC. Right now anytime I need to make a doc, I have to use husbands PC. Your letter inspired me though. I keep losing track of the need to write it all down, but I think that it is important to organize it all. No need to by MS Word! Open Office is FREE and opens all Word docs. It's a great prog. http://www.openoffice.org/ Wow, Dog! I just downloaded it and I am about to open it up and giver her a whirl. I have a paper and a 'powerpoint' to make this week for school, so hopefully- this will work! Thank you so much With some tweaks open office is great for power point, sorry no advice really, I only ever used open office, when I had my current computer loaded with linux as well as vista.
MagickMonkey Posted November 5, 2010 Posted November 5, 2010 Ditto the recommendation for Open Office. The interface is a little different, but I haven't run into any situations where I felt I'd be better off using MS Word.
ilovemybrain Posted November 11, 2010 Posted November 11, 2010 Found this letter I wrote to one of my church elder friends about six months before I deconverted. This letter was written Sept. 2007. I never mailed it though... I sucked it up and tried to make it all work. At this point I was heavily involved in church work and honestly wanted to live the Christian life. See if you can spot the warning signs... ...if I wanted to, I could systematically destroy every single thread that makes up the tapestry of my faith with a few simple questions, facts and arguments. It's actually quite easy. It would be painful to tear apart the thing that has shaped me since I was a child -- my Christian faith -- but at this point I see no reason not to. I might actually be happier as an end result. My faith is weak, and my past three-four years in this church have contributed to that. I am less willing to take things on faith than I once was and I am wondering if I need any faith at all, because it hasn't seem to make much difference. Why does God, who apparently created everything and takes delight in his creation, choose to hide himself, forcing his creation to be content with faith? When I play hide-and-seek with my daughter, it's my greatest joy to have her find me, and to give her a great big hug and laugh together when she does. Why does God want us to constantly chase him, leaving us to be content with half-imagined glimpses from the corners of our eyes? I don't understand. Why do none of my prayers ever seem to be answered? In my times of doubt, why does God not reveal himself to me in a way that answers my painful, soul-searching questions? It always comes down to me having to make the choice to believe, and I don't see much point in making that choice anymore. Life is the same, with or without God. At least without God I know that when something bad happens, it's not some test he sent. It's something to overcome, to apologize for, or to forgive someone for, and then get on with life. And without God, everything we do takes on more importance because this is it. There is no afterlife to give us a second chance. I have had moments of joy in the past few years, experiences that filled me up with happiness and made me feel excited and enthusiastic about life. I also felt inspired to do God's work, but once I got into the roller coaster of joy and misery which apparently makes up the Christian life, I found myself asking if there's anything more. Die, and go to eternal glory, is apparently the answer. Hardly comforting when you feel like you've been sentenced to life imprisonment in a way of life that promotes manic-depressive cycles of misery as normal. Wow, thanks for posting all that. I like your point that without god, we don't have to constantly wonder why everything happens the way it does, and wonder if it's our fault or if it's a stupid test or whatever. I'm curious now, to go look through my journals and see what I was thinking during the 2 years of my deconversion and how I was trying to rationalize...
Eugene39 Posted December 5, 2010 Posted December 5, 2010 I'm still amazed at all the efforts I also put into trying to make Christianity continue to make sense. I went through the four gospels and documented what OT scriptures that were quoted as being prophecy that Jesus fulfilled, or scriptures which he quoted. I started in Isaiah and went through Malachi, looking for prophecies and even bought a notebook and was writing commentary on what I was reading. I also went through Hebrews 11 and compared it to what is said in the OT. I'm looking now at what I wrote, and by that point in time, the cracks in my faith were starting to form. Reminiscing about this has been fun, unlike most of the reminiscing I've done on the fear of hell that was my childhood and teen years.
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