My Deconversion

[JadedAtheist]

I've been looking through the testimonies here for the last couple days and it's really impacted me. As I read some of them I thought my heart really broke. It's really confirmed in my mind how vile religion can be, especially the fundamentalist variety. While going through them I noticed several others have redone their testimonies and since I never liked mine so much I thought I'd do it over.

 

I'll keep it as short and sweet as possible but it's probably going to be very long

 

--The Back Story--

 

I grew up in a secular home and religion was never mentioned. The concept of God didn't occur to me until I was exposed to Christianity by Scripture classes in school. The thought even then seemed primitive and ludicrous. I remember thinking people must be delusional who believed in such things and that they're causing mental harm to their children by raising them in that environment. It's funny that this thought occurred to me at such a young age. I guess even then I was a fundamentalist of the atheistic variety. Despite not being taught English at home and even been kept back a year at school, I quickly started excelling. I moved forward a grade and there were even plans on moving me to the 6th grade (I was in the 1st at the time). My mother felt that I wouldn't fit in with the older kids and decided to keep me progressing like a normal child. I quickly became bored with school and this was probably the ultimate reason I dropped out in high school but more on that later.

 

When I was 8 the shit storm started. My mother went crazy overnight: She started hearing voices, seeing things, laughing out of nowhere and talking to herself. Even now I have 'ticks' because of her behavior at that time. Eventually she got to the point where she was convinced that I wasn't her son and brought me to the police station to give me away telling them that she found me on the street and felt sorry for me so she took me in. I remember the hatred she had for me and the way she looked at me at that time. The images are seared into my mind. They'll never go away. Anyways, the police realized she was crazy and they sent her to the loony bin. It was from this age that I then begin going in and out of foster homes until the age of 16. My mother would get better for a while and then relapse because she either stopped taking her medication or the medication became ineffective.

 

My time in foster homes, friend's places and refuges was hell for the most part. My first two foster homes were by far the worst. The first one was a Charismatic/Pentecostal family and after going to one of their services, I was royally freaked out. They seemed to be real tools as well because they told me that during my short stay there, they wouldn't do my laundry as they weren't getting paid for it. After them was another foster home with some Islander family. They were Mormon's and hypocrites. As a child I use to hang out with girls exclusively because the boys were too rough for my tastes. This attracted unwanted attention and I was constantly called a faggot or a poofter until I stopped hanging around them in the foster home. I eventually started hanging out exclusively with the boys in all aspects of life after that as well. We were yelled at and physically threatened on many occasions. When I couldn't take it anymore, I escaped. I devised a plan to distract the foster carers by locking them inside a room with keys that I stole earlier. After that I ran and ran and ran. I made it home and broke a window to get inside. I still have scars on my hands today because of it. Eventually I was found, the police had been notified. When I got back there, I was beaten.

 

Several family friends wanted to look after me but issues were caused and the friendships broken. It was then I was taken to a youth hostel/refuge and stayed there for a time. I enjoyed it there for the most part. I had a lot of independence and I met all kinds of people. I also got a kick ass allowance as well. Eventually the parents of a friend at school decided to take me in and despite some issues that didn't directly affect me, I really enjoyed it there. All the while I wasn't doing too crash hot at school. I wasn't doing any work in class nor any homework. I effectively got along by passing my tests and exams since they accounted for most of my marks. In fact in a lot of classes I was in the top 3 despite the lack of work. I just didn't find anything challenging so I didn't try. Eventually things changed so that my tests and exams no longer accounted for a large portion of marks and since I was at that points in my final year so many months behind, I dropped out.

 

--Where it Starts Getting Interesting--

 

Alongside this period, I began questioning everything that was happening in my life: Why did this all happen? What is the purpose of life? What happens when we die? All these kinds of questions dominated my mind. Even during that time I didn't take religion all too seriously but I began toying with it. One of my friends gave me a book of Mormon and I read it and as requested, prayed seeking the burning in my bosom. I didn't get it so I discarded Mormonism. I went to my mum's Orthodox church but was bored out of my mind. I went to a mosque and was weirded out. After this I basically did nothing for a couple years until I dropped out of school. I then began reading about religion. I got many books, starting off with introductions to various religious then to in depth texts.

 

I quickly came to realize that all religions were man made. I was mostly attracted to Buddhism as I had a belief in reincarnation (despite being an atheist I didn't like the concept of dying so this gave me a way out) but I soon found out that there were many schools of thought and some drastically different than others. I believed that this was a result of man modifying religion to suit his tastes. Also, I disliked that there was no "self" when one reincarnates. In other words, when we reincarnate it's not like our personality and essence is transfered. When we reincarnate we're nothing like our former existence. I was really disappointed but I moved on. I read up on Taoism, Islam, Judaism and Christianity. I found Islam to be way too barbaric for my tastes as I read the Quran and discarded it quickly. Upon finding out about the pagan history of Israel and that Yahweh was but another deity alongside many others I rejected both it and Christianity.

 

During my research into religion I become more open minded, more tolerant. Religion was no longer a plague to society but an alternate method of understanding the universe. Again, a silent period of a few years. I now hit college. I'm going along and again I found the work easy, too easy. I became careless and overconfident in my abilities. I left things to the last second too many times and I eventually started failing modules because I overestimated my ability to wing it. In my second year I get a Gideon's Bible. I try reading Matthew but I was bored by the genealogies. A couple months later I read it again, at the recommendation of a friend I start with the gospel of John. By the time I reach the 8th chapter, I'm hooked. As my conscience was getting more and more pricked, I began to get more and more confused. Why was I having difficulty understanding all of this? Why doesn't it seem to make sense? It was but a second after having those thoughts that I read the words of Christ: You do not understand my words because you are of your father the Devil.

 

Despite feeling like an idiot, I prayed the sinner's prayer by myself at night in my room. It wasn't a real emotional experience but I did all of a sudden find a resolve to rid myself of everything sinful. CDs, movies and the like all thrown out. All gone. The next morning it was like I was in a different body, it was surreal. Suddenly hearing people swear or blaspheme pierced the very soul of my being. Everything started to make sense, it started becoming clear. All the pieces that I couldn't put together as an atheist were made whole as a Christian. It all clicked, it all fit together and it all made sense. I knew Christianity was right. I knew it was right and that's why all the doubts I had were pushed aside and ignored for years to come.

 

--Life as a Christian--

 

I began going to church regularly. Every service, I was there. I read the Bible like there was no tomorrow. I dropped out of college and a few months later I got a job. I began buying Christian books. Tons of them. Apologetics and living a holy life were the main ones that I focused on. I was reading several books a week for months.I quickly got involved in evangelism and went door to door as well as street preaching. Many times I was asked to give my testimony. I was adored by not only my church but the churches my church affiliated with. There were plans on sending me to Vanuatu to help with the missionary work there for awhile before I went off to Bible college in the US. Behind all the excitement though I noticed many things that bothered me. Why was it that I as a new Christian was far more dedicated to church services than most other attendees? Why was I but a handful of people who regularly went evangelizing? Why was it that my knowledge of the Bible far exceeded almost all of the members and I was but a baby Christian?

 

It was these thoughts that helped fuel not only my legalism but my also my first serious shock to the faith. If Christianity is true, I imagined everyone to be 100% dedicated 100% of the time. As a true legalist though, I had my hidden sins. It was these that constantly plagued me in my Christian life. I would spend every night confessing my sins and asking for forgiveness. I would also ask for salvation night after night as I wasn't sure that I was saved. If I was, why did I sin so much? Didn't I have the Holy Spirit within me? After a while at the church I was attending, I began feeling uncomfortable with this KJO focus. I asked my pastor about it in private and instead of spouting off how the KJV was the only true word of God and every other translation is of Satan, he said it was of the best manuscripts. He also said that the other translations were not bad, just not as accurate. When I questioned him on this stance, my faith took its second major hit. He said that he didn't want to shake anyone's faith by getting into the whole issue of biblical manuscripts. If there was no sacred line of transmission, and since none of them fully agree, how could we trust the Bible? I left shattered by his response. It was due to ignorance these people were faithful, not due to knowledge.

 

Soon after all this, the pastor felt a calling to work with the underground church in China and we had to look for another pastor. The man who took over was a man who was discipling me. His extremist views eventually caused distance between himself and I and it was the primary reason I left that church. His utter disregard for scholars and theologians was the third major strike to my faith in a real short span of time. He warned the congregation to only read information preapproved by himself and to only get their questions answered by him. This utter disregard for knowledge and prompting people to have faith based on a single figure really messed with me. I realized that this environment hated knowledge because it feared it. It feared where the rabbit hole would go. After this and a couple of experiences where people started avoiding me because I corrected their false accusations concerning various translations, I left.

 

--The Mid Years--

 

I went to another fundamentalist church but this one was a lot different. It wasn't as legalistic as the others. It was at this church that some former acquaintances began attending alongside with me and a strong bond developed between the 4 of us. I was attending just like I normally did until I got hit with a major dose of depression. I began to despair and couldn't find any meaning or purpose to life. Living for God wasn't good enough. I needed more. The only time the feelings abated was while I was at work. I longed for sleep as it was my refuge from the hell I otherwise experienced. Eventually I couldn't handle it and I dropped out of church momentarily. I began to self medicate. I started drinking heavily and regularly because I noticed the pain of living went away when I was drunk. I took medication for a while but after only a little while the effects wore off and I stopped taking them and returned back to liquor. My doubts of my salvation were a major cause because I was effectively thinking "I'm unsaved anyways, so fuck it". It was then that I first came to this site. I read many testimonies and posts and found convincing stuff but I just couldn't let go. I feared hell too much. I started crying and I left this site and did not return until years later.

 

Eventually I had a huge argument with my parents and I told them I was leaving, I took my stuff and left home. At that point I turned back to God and just cried out to him to give me direction with my life, to remove this darkness from my life that made me think of killing myself every waking moment. The next morning I woke up and I was fine. The feelings dissipated. I met up with a Christian friend who told me he knew what I was going through. I laughed inside myself because he was such a goody two shoes. When opening up my heart he felt compelled to tell me his experiences and I was shocked. We formed a strong bond that's existed since that point despite our religious differences now. His care prompted me to go back to church and I slowly got involved again. I wasn't gone for too long, a few months and I never stopped believing what I believed.

--The Beginning of the End--

 

After this period I started getting right back into reading and this prompted my next shock to my faith (I can't even remember what number I'm up to now). As I read the OT (as I had done many times by this point) I began seeing things I didn't see before. Perhaps because the other times I was more focused on finishing my reading than understanding the text but regardless, something was different this time. I noticed that all of the Old Testament characters were ungodly people. They were people I did not want to be like nor did I think they were good examples to look up to. Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, David, Solomon and so on. This didn't settle well with me for some reason. Sure there was genocide and many other atrocities in the OT but it was the character of the *godly* people that disturbed me.

 

As all this was happening I was getting more and more dissatisfied with my job. All too many times I was put into a position where I had to go against my morals or face disciplinary actions. The environment was terrible but since I hate the job hunting process I just bore the burden. It was during this time that my doubts started to escalate. I'm not sure if anyone else experienced this but as I would read the Bible on occasion I would have a thought pop in my mind that said "You don't believe this" and other times "You know this isn't real" and also "You know these are lies". As a good Christian I dismissed the thoughts but the problem was they were getting more and more frequent. It got to the point where I couldn't read the Bible without this thoughts attacking me every moment I read it.

 

I cried out to God to relieve me of these doubts and they would go away for a time before returning back to me. I also started realizing that the Bible was doing its best job at explaining away why God wasn't interacting with the world. Prayer was answered according to his will. People didn't believe not because of good intellectual reasons but because their mind was darkened. The reason you didn't get any feelings in prayer or have him communicate back with you was to help prevent Satan from deceiving you as an angel of light. There seemed to be naturalistic explanations for everything and my thoughts kept turning back to Occam's Razor. It also began to occur to me that everyone was convinced in their own mind that they're right and that everyone uses the same tactics to defend their faith. The Bible began to seem more and more like a man made book and the doctrines of preservation, inspiration and infallibility seemed to have been read into it rather than taken from it.

 

Other naturalistic explanations came to mind as well. Here are some more that I copied from an email to a friend about my doubts:

 

 

• Prayer doesn't seem to be supernatural . In fact if deity didn’t exist, the same 3 possible outcomes we expect now would still occur. That is “Yes, No or Maybe”. In fact, these are the same answers that cults and other false religions get when they pray to their god(s).
• The maturity of the believer to being more like Christ is seen within other religions as well, not to mention those who are not religious. Maturity in age generally contributes to maturity in character. Christianity has no hold.
• The internal struggle within man is seen in all; even those who could not have the Holy Spirit. It’s in fact a commonly known condition for those whose desires conflict with their morals.
• Fighting sin with scripture has the same results as “positive thinking”. Psychology books will often tell you to memorize or repeat phrases to help overcome obstacles. I.E. weight loss, anger and et cetera. There is no supernatural power.
• There is generally no radical change in Christians upon their conversion. Most of Christendom would be classed as either apostate or backslidden. Very few take it seriously.

At this point I think if I was to be honest with myself. I stopped believing intellectually. This was about a year before my formal departure and a couple months before I started Bible college.

 

--The End--

 

As all of this was happening I was still going to church regularly, teaching and preaching and giving Christian advice. I was still evangelizing and even going to Bible college at this point. The last crack that happened to my faith was the realization that the reason everything made sense was because of cognitive dissonance. While I realized that everyone else was also convinced in their own minds they're right what stopped me was the fact that I knew the Christian world view was the best explanation for everything. When this term became known to me. I lost the remaining vestiges of faith I had. My hopes that Bible college would revive my faith were not realized and despite my pumping up the dosage on how much of the Bible I read and how much Christian music and literature I dug into, I still felt that my faith was gone. I was simply going through the motions.

 

What kept me clinging on was the fact that I didn't see any other world view as anything better than what I had, I didn't want evolution to be true and I didn't want to face the fact that death is the end. However, after many months of dealing with the internal conflict of going through the motions despite my beliefs I finally sent an email to my pastor informing him of what was happening as well as a few friends and that's the end of that. I've now enrolled into university and coming up to nearly a year, I've kept plowing on without failing anything or dropping out

 

I don't remember what my last prayer was. I prayed many many times as I was getting closer to the edge but on a journal that I was keeping at the time, the last words in it were "Dear Lord, forgive my unbelief."

 

I doubt anyone will read this but I wanted to get it off my chest! If you did read it, I'm surprised and thankful!

[cheerphil]

I enjoyed your story. It is a painful journey but it gets better. Religion cause a lot of harm and many of us has suffered. Good luck on your journey!

[Kathlene]

I thoroughly enjoyed reading through that. I hope you are walking well on your journey now and finding freedom.

[Margee]

Jaded, I read the whole story and I want to thank you so much for writing this out. It has helped me more than you'll ever know. I related to this in so many ways. I think you should keep writing about 10 more chapters and make it into a book. Your story is an incredible journey of courage.

 

Something 'struck' me as I was reading about your childhood and the song we all learn in Sunday school: 'Jesus loves me this I know'.............and his scripture that says he even sees a sparrow fall to the ground....... ....or he knows how many hairs are on your head............ and ''don't worry about the lilies, doesn't god provide for them''.............. and ''let the little children come to me''? All these things we learn about god?? I started to ask myself (during my deconversion) where are you in all this?? I would have asked:''didn't you see little Jaded'' and his childhood? And I would have further asked:''Why didn't you make his mom well, so she could nurture her little boy the way a mom does''?

 

These are the things that started me on my faith decline.

 

You are a wonderful man of survival and courage. Your letter really touched my heart. Thank you Jaded for helping me in my continuing journey of 'deconverting'. It is stories like this that help me know that I am finally on the right path.

 

Life is just better, wihtout having to try and figure this sky god out......

[Overcame Faith]

We just never know what our friends on ExC have gone through until they graciously share their experiences with us. Thank-you, Jaded, for sharing. It is quite the story. You endured a lot and I am happy that you are where you are now and I am especially happy to know you.

[Eugene39]

Thanks much for posting your story. I always enjoy those stories from those who deconverted similar to the way it happened to me: through thinking about what the Bible says. Glad you are healing.

[JadedAtheist]

Thanks for the kind words everyone, it does mean a lot

[SillyString]

" I would spend every night confessing my sins and asking for forgiveness. I would also ask for salvation night after night as I wasn't sure that I was saved."

I did the same thing. Every single night.

Thanks for sharing your story, Jaded.

[saintpat]

Fascinating story, sounds familiar. I always here from Christians about how they lose their faith after studying the Bible.

 

My cousin's wife also lost her faith after getting her Master's in Christian studies. I'm afraid her education has left her few skills to get by in the world. I sincerely hope you will got back to school at some point and major in something useful.

[Paradox]

You're evidently a talented writer. I was enthralled by your story.

I'll just say that I never had any affinity with scripture -- always thought that it was a great castle in the sky. This forum wouldn't have a fraction of its membership were it that all Christian churches were all liberal through and through.

[Joss]

Thank you for sharing your story. I was deeply touched by it.

[ScifiChick]

That was a very touching story Jaded. I am sooooo sorry for what you have been through. I hope your life continues to get better and better and more and more fulfilling.