Does It Ever Bother You?

[Yask]

I was raised in a Christian family. From the time I was three I was taken to church. My first experience was in a denominational branch I can't recall. However, I do remember the minister.

 

My grandparents, on my dad's side, ended up taking me. I never knew why my folks stopped going shortly after our first visit, (it was the grand folks church first), but I guess they figured a child needed religious upbringing, so they gave my grandparents permission to cart me off every Sunday.

 

The minister in those days didn't have, or need, a PA system. He screamed from the pulpit the entire sermon. This bellowing voice that was so loud that the acoustics of this little church in the grove carried his booming baritone all the way to the back pew, where we sat. The only two things I remember of those experiences was standing on the pew with my hands over my ears and screaming to drown him out with my own muffled cries.

 

Later, we ended up attending southern Baptist church and then that what simply called itself a Baptist church. The pastor of the later church was new, from Texas,and seemed in competition with our old pastor from whom he seduced with his passionate ministry, most of his congregation. Which included my family.

And then he had an epiphany. Open a Christian school within the church. Start a building fund and organize it from K to 12.

It was hell on earth that included the co-pastor, Texas Satan himself, as the principle. Who practiced corporal punishment with a paddle 2 inches thick, 11 inches long, 5 inches wide with huge quarter size holes bore through the surface.(On the sides and down the middle) Which retarded the air flow from holding the impact back on the down swing.

 

I attended that school for two years until finally, finally, my parents heard me when I said I wasn't going to go for a third. That when I entered the Principle took me into a private meeting and said he knew I'd been in Public school all my years until then. But that they were going to school me in god's way now. And that would mean banishing the devil that steeped his way into public school.

He sure as hell tried. Roughly once a week, every week for two years I was beaten with that paddle.

 

But not before I had to go before my peers in the class I was taken out of so the punishment could commence, which was always intended to be a shaming scene, and then escorted back to ask those classmates forgiveness for my "sin". (By a show of hands. I stood and bowed my head awaiting their pardon. While looking through my bangs to see if anyone dared not raise their hand. There were a few.)

And then I was escorted back to the principles office for three stern whacks, after we prayed for my forgiveness there too. Just me and Principle Bowman.

The third year my dad heard me when I told him I refused to return to hell. Somehow all those times before he'd not listened. But he did this time. He insisted as usual, saying it was a better education than that of a public school. And I told him that if he sent me back, the first visit I made to that principles office, I'd beat the man to death with his own paddle.

 

My dad believed.

And I was free.

 

I later had it out with that principle, by phone. I knew he was going to call because of a turn of events that made it necessary. As I intended. I knew what he'd learned would "weigh on his conscience". As I intended and as he admitted on the phone.

I had the last words, I cursed him to the hell he deserved and then to silence that I knew meant he was stunned and still listening, I hung up.

That was decades ago and to this day I hope he died screaming.

 

I later moved to Florida for school. Found a book on Witchcraft that caught my eye and sat against the stacks out of the way of any shoppers, which were not a lot in that tiny store on Dale Mabry highway, and read what felt like a coming home.

In school, for book reports (The public school of course), I'd always make my topic something to do with the occult or astronomy. So that book that day caught my eye with an orange title. "WITCHCRAFT" By:Dr. Leo Louis Martello.

 

I was Wiccan! And it felt right. Natural, as if that was me all my life and all my angst and rebellion against being dragged to church from as young as I could remember, suddenly made sense.

 

And then I grew out of it, because I find I'm not one who's into structure. I'm flakey, you might say. I delve into something that catches my interest and when I've had enough of the experience I move on.

So no, I don't have any tattoos! lol But I do like them. On other people.

 

So then I found atheism, because that did indeed make sense and still does to this day. I don't accept that any man made Deity exists. It's simply not logical to think limited human intellect could conceive, much less "author" holy books channeled by it, so as to manifest earthly organized doctrines that give it praise because it approves.

 

Pantheism however, is do-able. All that exists is energy that is responsible for all that is. And while that can be called "god" or "goddess" by many, it still makes more sense that that is the source, without the cult attachments, for all that is. Whatever noun one wants to attach to make it more personable.

 

So then I started to study Theology. Lay study only. No higher education enrollment.

 

And that's what brings me to ask this question.

 

As many ex-Christians go through the roles I've gone through, study what they formerly accepted on faith so as to find it's origins, etc...

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

 

Is it upsetting that that fable, fairy tale, wasn't true after all?

 

I know it's a self-deprecating poorly written fiction. Now.

However, as many Christians recall, it didn't feel like that at the time. We simply were led to believe, without stepping back and taking a good look, even a cursory rational dissection of all that we were told to accept as true, to see what we were really being told we were. And what was expected of us, so as to insure Heaven.

 

Thanks for reading this far.

 

 

Christianity - The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree.

[Eugene39]

At times, yes, I get angry. What angers me is the self-depreciating, worthless view of yourself that Christianity preaches. How God can't even accept you, unless you find Jesus or you burn in hell. How just because a person has feelings, sexuality, etc. - that can send you to hell.

[Margee]

Welcome Yask! I enjoyed your story. Thanks for sharing. I think I made my way through the anger stage this year, on this site. Your friggin' right I felt anger! I said it before - it was like finding out at 50 years old that the 'santa claus' in the sky didn't exist. I was devastated!!

 

Now I have been peicing together my life and how I'd like it to be and figuring out who I really am now that I don't have to please the magic man in the sky. It's been quite a journey.................. Looking forward to hearing more from you my friend!!

[Yask]

I know what you mean.

When I was a kid we could only attend Sunday school. My favorite part was when we started studying Noah's ark.

 

The volunteer teacher was a matronly type woman, who designed the room to look like we were inside the ark. Cut out animals lined the walls. There were cut outs for the ark windows. And she even had hay bales set around the room near some of the animals that would normally eat such stuff. It was great because I have always loved animals.

 

I remember in those days the teachings from the Bible were all kid related. There was no deep delving into sin, sinners, hell, damnation,etc... We were told we had been born as imperfect beings and that only through Christ's sacrifice were we reunited with god the father.

 

It wasn't until we grew old enough to graduate to attending regular church upstairs, that all the doom and gloom were added in.

 

Now, I realize it's a hard wiring technique. Because even as kids we were told that old verse from Proverbs 22:6 . Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

 

The fear paradigm of Christianity, taught to the very young, isn't really intended to be rationally dissected, I don't think. In fact, if Christians thought about what was being asked of them, without fearing hell for daring to "question god", I think there would be even more of an exodus from the church than what has occurred in the last few years.

 

I remember reading in 2007, I think it was, how for the first time atheist book titles had outsold Theist. And in the church of England, they were laying blame on, of all things, "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" for the mass exodus of women from their congregation.

Now, I've heard that old axion; the devil made me do it. But Buffy? lol

 

And it's all so simple to decode. So right there in your face and yet so rarely seen, as to what Christianity's tenets propose as the one and only "true faith" in life and life everlasting afterward.

 

God, an omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, being created man and woman. (Twice! Two different creations, which given Genesis chapter 1 & 2 should give a clue right there. When there can't be two different firsts!) In his own image and likeness.

He made them without knowledge but he told them to obey his command not to eat of the fruit of the tree his omniscient self planted in paradise. Which couldn't be paradise if it contained a tree with damnable fruit.

And sure enough, security was lax because omnipresent god's nemesis slithered in and tempted eve to eat of the fruit of the tree of knowledge.

And instead of omnibenevolence forgiving, he damned her, Adam and their seed forever.

 

Until he sent himself to change that rule he made himself. If only humans would believe he suffered and died to take away the sin he placed upon the whole human race for being born human, by his will. And damned, by his pronouncement.

So that salvation is actually asking to be saved from god!

Because otherwise, we're damned by god. For being created exactly as he made us to be.

 

It's one of those situations where I'd love to enter into the body of one of those megachurch preachers, like Osteen?! And preach that to the throngs in person and joining in on cable.

 

Then, depart from his body and watch him deal with the outcome. After all, that bit about poverty and money and it being easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than a rich man to enter Heaven, must be passages those type ministers ignore.

Since Osteen lives in a brand new 10.5 million dollar mansion, Benny Hinn once begged his congregation for 2 million dollars, Oral Roberts begged for 7 million years ago, else god promised he was going to take him home! And he got the money and then some! And why? Because not one single donor, one of which was a Texas millionaire that donated 1 million off the bat, ever realized through the fog of sheepish faith, to ask; isn't god taking Oral home what every Christian lives for?

 

How is it god can be bought and Oral wants to sell himself to have to live here on earth one more day, for the price of a few million bucks?

 

Now old Oral is dead.

And oh so surprised.

[Yask]

Welcome Yask! I enjoyed your story. Thanks for sharing. I think I made my way through the anger stage this year, on this site. Your friggin' right I felt anger! I said it before - it was like finding out at 50 years old that the 'santa claus' in the sky didn't exist. I was devastated!!

 

Now I have been peicing together my life and how I'd like it to be and figuring out who I really am now that I don't have to please the magic man in the sky. It's been quite a journey.................. Looking forward to hearing more from you my friend!!

 

Thank you.

 

I was angry too. To think that we'd, (my family and I) had been lied to all those years. And my parents died not ever realizing it. But instead hoping to see god and be with Jesus in Heaven, after they both succumbed to cancer.

To know that that was all a lie to keep them aligned as one more in the flock of the deluded does indeed piss me off.

 

But as you said, we get over it when we realize the truth. Holding on to the rage, as I see it, just gives the cult more power over me, but in a different way. And yet, to see the churches everywhere and people with little gold Roman capital punishment devices dangling around their neck, to remind them of a death penalty and torture that is proof of love, does still take a bit of getting over.

 

Mostly from wanting to say aloud to their face; you don't really believe all that crap do you?

You're asking to be saved from god, by god.

But you know they're desperate to convert souls to that story when you find tracts in the bathroom stall at WalMart.

That's why I bring a black sharpie with me when I go shopping at WalMart.

[Casey]

Welcome Yask! I can relate to your school history, although with me this was of the fundamentalist catholic variety. The two were, it seems, not dissimilar when it came to brutalizing children. Still, it was many years ago when I endured that, although there are some loose ends I am trying to tie up at the moment. Like you I too, could wish some christians into the hell they held out so gloatingly for others not of their persuasion. Not to mention they were no slouches at creating hell in the here and now for children who were in their clutches.

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

(Yask)

 

Well, no. I take solace in this:

 

 

Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones

(Marcus Aurelius)

 

In other words, you will either pass into nothingness or you will get what you gave. Either way, that will do me. Christians would call that "Salvation by Works," or Secular Humanism I suppose, but they have no answer to it.

 

As their own fairy tale suggests, if that great yarn about the resurrection isn't true, then they are the most miserable of men! I am content to do whatever I like with what remains of my life, that doesn't hurt others, without having to please some otherwordly tyrant!

Regards,

Casey

[Antlerman]

And that's what brings me to ask this question.

 

As many ex-Christians go through the roles I've gone through, study what they formerly accepted on faith so as to find it's origins, etc...

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

 

Is it upsetting that that fable, fairy tale, wasn't true after all?

 

I know it's a self-deprecating poorly written fiction. Now.

However, as many Christians recall, it didn't feel like that at the time. We simply were led to believe, without stepping back and taking a good look, even a cursory rational dissection of all that we were told to accept as true, to see what we were really being told we were. And what was expected of us, so as to insure Heaven.

There is an important understanding I've come into that helps answer and lay to rest peaceably the question of 'being lied to'. You said it yourself in here that, "it didn't feel like it at the time". That's an important observation. At the time, it wasn't a lie. It's simply how you saw the world with where you were at. It was consistent with a mode of thinking, and both reflective and expressive of that. It isn't a lie, it's a way of thinking and expressing it symbolically.

 

It is like seeing the world through the eyes of a child. It is reality to them, even though to you it now isn't. They are not 'believing a lie', they are seeing the world as a child. You are in a different place. It is irrelevant they may be the same biological age. There is a whole lot more to a developed mind than that.

[espresso]

Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones

(Marcus Aurelius)

 

In other words, you will either pass into nothingness or you will get what you gave. Either way, that will do me. Christians would call that "Salvation by Works," or Secular Humanism I suppose, but they have no answer to it.

 

As their own fairy tale suggests, if that great yarn about the resurrection isn't true, then they are the most miserable of men! I am content to do whatever I like with what remains of my life, that doesn't hurt others, without having to please some otherwordly tyrant!

Regards,

Casey

 

Casey, thank you so much for posting this! This sentiment was what finally helped me break the last tie to Christianity--fear of hell--only I had never heard this quote. I love it!

[espresso]

 

So then I started to study Theology. Lay study only. No higher education enrollment.

 

And that's what brings me to ask this question.

 

As many ex-Christians go through the roles I've gone through, study what they formerly accepted on faith so as to find it's origins, etc...

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

 

Is it upsetting that that fable, fairy tale, wasn't true after all?

 

I know it's a self-deprecating poorly written fiction. Now.

However, as many Christians recall, it didn't feel like that at the time. We simply were led to believe, without stepping back and taking a good look, even a cursory rational dissection of all that we were told to accept as true, to see what we were really being told we were. And what was expected of us, so as to insure Heaven.

 

Thanks for reading this far.

 

 

Christianity - The belief that a cosmic Jewish Zombie who was his own father can make you live forever if you symbolically eat his flesh and telepathically tell him you accept him as your master, so he can remove an evil force from your soul that is present in humanity because a rib-woman was convinced by a talking snake to eat from a magical tree.

 

I'm not angry, because my parents, grandparents, friends, etc all honestly believed everything, and according to their deepest beliefs they were acting in the most loving and caring way they possibly could towards me. I would be upset if they had not truly believed what they were teaching me, but they did. I would be upset if they truly believed but didn't teach me, because it would mean they didn't care. It's definitely messed me up some, but I think that everyone has shit from their childhood to deal with and if I could choose which shit would be my lot, I would choose to be brought up in a loving, slightly-less-crazy Christian community that I later escape from, as was the case in my life.

 

There are two things, however, that do make me furious.

 

1. The way that people without faith are dealt with, both within their immediate communities (family, etc) and in the US community at large. The fact that my parents will never be happy for me no matter how great I've made my life, or the fact that our politicians basically won't get elected unless they say they believe in God, both burn me up.

 

2. The perpetuation of Christianity--both the needless suffering and waste of life that many adults go through because they are within Christianity, and the way that I see so many children being brainwashed literally starting in the womb. My nephew is being read childrens' books about GOD and I usually have to quietly leave the room because I get so upset. I believe that his parents have the right to raise him however they think best, but I dread the day when he toddles over to me with a colorful storybook about the Passion and clambers into my lap wanting me to read it to him.

[seriously]

I don't remember being angry about being about the Bible being false at all. I don't know if I ever was as attached to religion like so many here once were. It was a worldview I accepted in lieu of others, but as soon as I had been exposed to something different the childish assumption that the Bible is completely correct fell away.

The only thing I am angry at is how people use the Bible as justification for prejudice, willful ignorance, and power grabs.

[Yask]

Casey,

Thank you for your insight and the Marcus Aurelius quote. I shall keep that in my collection of wise words. You have given me something to think about and a new perspective on my place as a former Christian. Indeed, I think the wisdom shared in this thread thus far by so many, will help a lot of people.

It is indeed a blessing. And those I do believe in still. However, I believe they are what we give to one another and what the powers of nature, chaos, what have you, bring about in the rhythms of a life that doesn't find me especially special at all. While I adore every minute of it.

 

 

Antlerman,

Your insight bears great wisdom that is so simple as to have missed it while I was wrapped in my thoughts of victim as I imagined I had indeed lived a lie. I thank you for opening my thoughts that will free me even more now. And in the process, I may be able to help others who I've heard in other circles speak as I did, until now. Until you. (HUGS) Thank you .

[Antlerman]

Antlerman,

Your insight bears great wisdom that is so simple as to have missed it while I was wrapped in my thoughts of victim as I imagined I had indeed lived a lie. I thank you for opening my thoughts that will free me even more now. And in the process, I may be able to help others who I've heard in other circles speak as I did, until now. Until you. (HUGS) Thank you .

You're more than welcome. This makes me happy it spoke to you and will bring some peace. Understanding this also helps my feelings toward others where they are at, and to have compassion towards them through that knowing, even if they themselves are unable to see beyond where they are at.

 

To them you are a mystery and they have to try to pigeon hole you some way in order to know what to do with you; labels that don't apply, that you are lost, deceived, given to disobedience to God, and what have you. My signature line below captures this from Ralph Waldo Emerson, "What we are, that only can we see". Someone who has never moved to where you have cannot perceive the world through eyes they have never seen through before. However, you can through theirs, because you have been there and moved beyond.

 

Just a couple more thoughts for you.

[Ouroboros]

And that's what brings me to ask this question.

 

As many ex-Christians go through the roles I've gone through, study what they formerly accepted on faith so as to find it's origins, etc...

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

Somewhat. In a sense I wish I had known the truth earlier, for the reason that I would have made different choices in life and not "trusted God" when I should have just tried to solve the problems. Problems went unresolved because I thought everything would work out by God's help, it didn't.

 

But on the other hand, without the experience, I wouldn't be the person I am today. It taught me things that I might not have learned without it.

[SilentLoner]

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

 

Is it upsetting that that fable, fairy tale, wasn't true after all?

 

Yes and yes. I invested a lot of trust, fear and love towards god/jesus based on what I was told growing up. I can't help but feel like a damn fool sometimes.

 

 

Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones

(Marcus Aurelius)

 

Nice quote though, Casey.

[Yask]

Antlerman,

 

Thank you again. It's a beautiful thing when something that is so obvious but none the less is missed, is brought into the light. I think it's because now I'm ready to see, when before the wisdom you share wasn't something I could think of because I was still back in the days when I was going through it, and then freed from it, still lived the regret of having been there.

 

Which brings me to Ouroboros. Wise words indeed. Everything we experience makes us who we are.

 

It's like they say, you are not those things you have done. Rather, you are the living wisdom of all that you've survived.

 

I've known that for awhile and yet somehow I didn't include my experiences with the Christian faith. It's like I set it to the side as something that happened to me, rather than something that helped teach me who I really am.

 

I thank you both for what has already proven to be a gift in being here at ex-C.

And Otaku, I know where you're coming from as well. Perhaps all that's shared here in this thread shall serve as a blessing and a healing for the both of us.

[agnosticator]

I had the last words, I cursed him to the hell he deserved and then to silence that I knew meant he was stunned and still listening, I hung up.

That was decades ago and to this day I hope he died screaming.

 

Hi, Yask! He needed to hear that! It's people like your old pastor that perpetuate the decadence of Christianity. I am angered whenever I run into one of those kind. They are just rotten. They don't have what it takes to be an empathetic human being. If they were atheists, they would be just as rotten to the core. But the Bible inspires and empowers them to terrorize the sheep. Power and control is what they live for, and the Bible endorses it.

 

I really enjoy reading all of your posts.You got style, girl!

[Yask]

[

I really enjoy reading all of your posts.You got style, girl!

 

Thank you.

[Chikirin]

 

 

Does it ever bother you that you were lied to about Jesus, God, and the whole myth that is Christianity?

 

Is it upsetting that that fable, fairy tale, wasn't true after all?

 

 

 

 

 

At the time, I knew that there were individual points of dogma didn't make sense, like the Trinity, but I was swayed by the idea that all the little points made a greater sense when taken as a whole, and that if people couldn't see that, then I had to pray that God would remove the scales from their eyes.

 

Now I look back and I feel that I was just making excuses for my lack of logic, I was more into feeling and intuition (that's my enneagram).

 

The thing that I have the most trouble with is dealign with my mortality, I never had to deal with it before because I thought my soul would live for eternity, and now I have to adjust to the realization that I'm nothing more than a bag of meat, which depresses me.

[Noggy]

 

 

You're cute. Lets get some coffee.

[Yask]

I don't drink coffee, Noggy. Tea, perhaps?

 

Chikirin, We're not a bag of meat. We're a walking meat stick, with hair! (OK, only sometimes. That's the hair part.)

 

I don't think we need religion to impart our sense of morality. And I also don't think we need religion to imagine we'll continue somewhere else, after we depart this place. Energy never dies. And thank goodness Physics hasn't yet said anything to validate Karma.

 

 

 

"You're not your job. You're not how much money you have in the bank. You're not the car you drive. You're not the contents of your wallet. You're not your fucking khakis. You're the all-singing, all-dancing crap of the world." Tyler Durden - Fight Club

[DT761138]

Fear of hell is not a major theme for every Christian. More of a fear for fundamentalists (I'd count most Baptists as that now days) and conservative Christians in some protestant denoms. Other Christians cling to their faith because they are afraid of life without a benevolent all-powerful figure watching over them and that's often implied, is in control of their destiny. I have less issue with those types, but still, the thinking can often enable the former belief. There's a third kind of theism, "God as metaphor/symbol" and well, it gets so little time I won't even bother to give it much thought, although its quite real as well, just most Christians never get that intellectually and spiritually mature to realize it.

[MultifariousBirdLady]

At times, yes, I get angry. What angers me is the self-depreciating, worthless view of yourself that Christianity preaches. How God can't even accept you, unless you find Jesus or you burn in hell. How just because a person has feelings, sexuality, etc. - that can send you to hell.

This. I've let go of a whole lot of the anger I used to have towards Christianity... most of it, even. But this lingers.

 

And yet that ideology still affects me.

[Xerces]

Fuck no, I felt true freedom after ditching that insanity.

[izzytheterri]

I get mad at the lie, but not particular at the current liars, because I know from experience how much they honestly believe it is true. I feel that years ago, people knew this was a lie and went on with it. I also feel that today there are many evangelists, and preachers that know it's a lie, and keep on with it. And those people I get angry at.

 

Mother Theresa is an example of someone who had no faith but still went on preaching. She did a great deal of good in her time, so I'm certainly not against her, but she didn't believe at all. It's sad that those people go on preaching something they have no connection with.

[lunaticheathen]

I too get more angry at the self-loathing, guilt, and fear of modern evangelical christianity, rather than the "fairy tale" aspect. I have a great respect for myth, and think it can do great things for humanity, inside and outside of christianity.

But the whole "you're a complete pile of shit without Jesus, and if you don't feel the Holy Spirit within you, you're damned to hell and no good to anyone - oh yeah, and if you're a female, you're twice as filthy" sometimes still makes me so angry I want to punch things. Like Eugene, I was taught thinking about sin was just as bad as the act itself. I attempted suicide because of that shit. That is not love, it's not true religion, and has nothing to do with deity or spirit. It's just hatefulness and spite.