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Goodbye Jesus

What Was The Last Thing You Studied Before You Left?


spiritrider2013

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For me, it wasn't any one thing that I studied. It was the culmination of years of doubts that I could no longer ignore or conveniently write off as being from the devil. This was in early 2000, and I went online and started looking for information that was critical of the Bible. I honestly didn't expect to find much. Who could say much bad or find much fault with the Word of God? Wow, was I in for a big surprise! I found infidels.org and rejectionofpascalswager.net and things went from there.

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  • 3 weeks later...
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The last thing I studied was my Miranda Rights as they were being read to me by the arresting officer (it's a long story).

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The last thing I studied was my Miranda Rights as they were being read to me by the arresting officer (it's a long story).

And you're gonna leave it at that?

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The last thing I studied was my Miranda Rights as they were being read to me by the arresting officer (it's a long story).

And you're gonna leave it at that?

 

 

Oh, you want details, I suppose.  Well, if memory serves, the handcuffs really hurt.

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The last thing I studied was not only church history, I was also invited to join a buybull study that Patty, the one in charge of the newcomers was facilitating. I've mentioned her before. It went on from October to December 2012. This buybull study was small, and it was about "courageous women." The author who wrote the study guide for it was REALLY grasping at straws. The others there were major batshit fundies who thought doing good for the sake of goodness instead of doing good because of religion was a novel concept. One was a convert who seemed absolutely baffled at that idea. When I mentioned my experience with the JWs at my door when I was 15, I said I drew the line at suckering kids, and Patty couldn't even look at me. Neither could the others there, for that matter. Talking to them outside of buybull study was virtually impossible, it was like talking to a brick wall. Even back then, I noticed that almost all the questions at the end of each section all came to the same conclusion, and it felt like I was beating a dead horse.

 

By that point, so much had gone on that I think this was incidental to my departure, with a couple more minor incidents to come. Two months later, I was out of there.

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The last thing I studied was my Miranda Rights as they were being read to me by the arresting officer (it's a long story).

 

And you're gonna leave it at that?

 

Oh, you want details, I suppose.  Well, if memory serves, the handcuffs really hurt.

wow,,, sounds interesting, kinky and S/M,,,,, more details please,,, much appreciated

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The last thing I studied was my Miranda Rights as they were being read to me by the arresting officer (it's a long story).

And you're gonna leave it at that?
 

Oh, you want details, I suppose.  Well, if memory serves, the handcuffs really hurt.

wow,,, sounds interesting, kinky and S/M,,,,, more details please,,, much appreciated

 

 

No, there was nothing kinky about it.  The arresting officer was named Jay and he wouldn't let me smoke in the police car.

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The last thing for me was Rick Warren's 40 days of purpose. As I attended these study groups it became more and more clear to me that Christianity was a world of fantasy and delusion. Nothing more. Yes, Rick warren had a hand in my deconversion!

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I tried to save my faith by studying prophecy.. Things didn't go as planned.

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The last thing for me was Rick Warren's 40 days of purpose. As I attended these study groups it became more and more clear to me that Christianity was a world of fantasy and delusion. Nothing more. Yes, Rick warren had a hand in my deconversion!

I'm glad I'm not the only one who was not impressed with that book!  A friend and I tried to seriously go through it and do all the work together. We weren't particularly xian any more, but figured it would have some good insights into finding our "purpose."  As we got to the end, we were both so disappointed!  And we really tried.  It was pathetic --at that time churches were real big on doing that book as a bible study and everybody was so amazed at how it transformed their lives!  We were unimpressed, there was nothing in that book that we hadn't already thought about (and thought we were very deep!) in 8th grade.

 

Either your typical church-goer is pathetically shallow for never having thought of anything beyond an 8th grade level, or they just agree with whatever everybody says so they don't make waves because they just want to get out of there, or they are just truly sheeple.

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I'm not sure, because it was so long ago, but I think the last thing I really studied was about homosexuality, trying to understand why Christians got their homophobic panties in a bunch about it, and trying to understand how a loving god could deny a romantic love to people just because of gender. The "it's ok for them to be attracted to the opposite sex, they just can't ACT on it" thing just didn't make sense to me. It seemed to be that no matter what, everyone was just relying on their own interpretation of the bible. Frustrating.

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We were unimpressed, there was nothing in that book that we hadn't already thought about (and thought we were very deep!) in 8th grade.

 

 

Much the same with me! LOL.  


 

Either your typical church-goer is pathetically shallow for never having thought of anything beyond an 8th grade level, or they just agree with whatever everybody says so they don't make waves because they just want to get out of there, or they are just truly sheeple.

 

During our discussions I brought up a lot of my own doubts and cynicism about the material. I found a lot of the Christians in the group agreed with me. It's funny how they will agree with your arguments when they believe you're a committed Christian,but as soon as you're an Ex-c then nothing you say will ever make them reconsider their stance.


 

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I'm not sure, because it was so long ago, but I think the last thing I really studied was about homosexuality, trying to understand why Christians got their homophobic panties in a bunch about it, and trying to understand how a loving god could deny a romantic love to people just because of gender. The "it's ok for them to be attracted to the opposite sex, they just can't ACT on it" thing just didn't make sense to me. It seemed to be that no matter what, everyone was just relying on their own interpretation of the bible. Frustrating.

 

It's like the Pet shop Boys say...

 

Everything I've ever done

Everything I ever do

Every place I've ever been

Everywhere I'm going to

It's a sin

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I'm not sure, because it was so long ago, but I think the last thing I really studied was about homosexuality, trying to understand why Christians got their homophobic panties in a bunch about it, and trying to understand how a loving god could deny a romantic love to people just because of gender. The "it's ok for them to be attracted to the opposite sex, they just can't ACT on it" thing just didn't make sense to me. It seemed to be that no matter what, everyone was just relying on their own interpretation of the bible. Frustrating.

I hear this view expressed sometimes and it is so offensive, so mean-spirited, self-righteous, priggish, just so plain old nasty.  "I am a married heterosexual, so I am ALLOWED to have sex with my spouse and it is a BLESSING from god.  YOU are not because YOU are either single or a homosexual, so you are not ALLOWED to have sex.  With anybody.  Ever.  Your entire life.  Unless you marry someone of the opposite sex.  Then you will be ALLOWED to have sex with your spouse and it will be a BLESSING, and YOU will be as SPECIAL as ME!"  Fuck off, asshat.

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I think I got as far as lamentations, where the Lord said something like, "Israel has become a whore. You've whored yourself out for money. And then you whored yourself out to men from outside the country. You become such a whore that you started paying other men to sleep with you and you enjoyed being raped" ... something like that.

 

It was then that I could see the narrative was clearly coming from a man frustrated at the stupidity of man's affixation with the concept of Gods and clearly was taking them on a path from polytheism to monotheism and eventually sanstheism (no Gods).

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It was Paul's books that did me in.  I can't quite put my finger on what it was that was so unsettling to me about Paul.  But I knew reading his books that he is not somebody I'd ever want to associate with.  Very angry, dominating man, might as well have gone off on a crusade or something.  I don't want to be like Paul. 

i could never stand paul myself. what an angry dude, sexist, and very fanatical. definitely not someone i would want to have dinner with.

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It was Paul's books that did me in. I can't quite put my finger on what it was that was so unsettling to me about Paul. But I knew reading his books that he is not somebody I'd ever want to associate with. Very angry, dominating man, might as well have gone off on a crusade or something. I don't want to be like Paul.

i could never stand paul myself. what an angry dude, sexist, and very fanatical. definitely not someone i would want to have dinner with.

Before I de-converted, my father would sometimes talk about heaven and how great it will be. "You'll get to meet all sorts of cool people. Like Moses, and Abraham, and John, and Mary, and Elijah....and Paul!!!" I thought, "Ehhh....is it bad if I don't really want to see him?" Thank god that's not going to happen. I would probably get in trouble for having an argument with Paul and yelling at him. :P

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  • 3 weeks later...

It all started for me about 8 months ago when my husband, who went to church with me to try and find himself there, questioned the pastor's sermon about how god commanded the Israelites to commit genocide.  I had to finally face the fact that this was somehow wrong.  I had been studying the bible for over 35 years and knew all the pat answers to these situations.  My husband and I had many conversations after that, revealing our doubts over many questionable xtian beliefs.  I did alot of reading on the internet and eventually found Ex-c. For that, I am so grateful!  The case against xianity was building with our pastor's very public stand on politics and the methodist's stand on homosexuality.  Looking back, one thing led to another and then we left the church and never looked back.  I am learning so much from this website as I go through my de-conversion. It hasn't been easy but it is a process that I am learning to walk thru.

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The sermons that finally stopped me from going to church were about money. The very last church I attended for 3 years was 'The Word of Faith' churches. This was a small church compared to the one I went to for many years. It seated 300 people and it wasn't even near full on sundays. Then the pastor 'got a word' from the lord that he was to build a church that seated 3,000 and we were to pay for it. It took 4 Sundays for me to completely cut my ties with that church. That's when I wrote 'the letter to my Pastor' that I posted here 3 years ago. It didn't go well.

 

I went to one last church after that. This was 'The church of Grace'. That lasted about 8 months. By then, I couldn't even take communion (it really did look like a cult to me at that time)  or sing the songs. I couldn't raise my hands anymore......it was gone...I knew in my heart I was done. That's when I found Ex-c and was probably one of the happiest days of my life....to know that I was not the only person who questioned the christian church.

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The sermons that finally stopped me from going to church were about money. The very last church I attended for 3 years was 'The Word of Faith' churches. This was a small church compared to the one I went to for many years. It seated 300 people and it wasn't even near full on sundays. Then the pastor 'got a word' from the lord that he was to build a church that seated 3,000 and we were to pay for it. It took 4 Sundays for me to completely cut my ties with that church. That's when I wrote 'the letter to my Pastor' that I posted here 3 years ago. It didn't go well.

 

I went to one last church after that. This was 'The church of Grace'. That lasted about 8 months. By then, I couldn't even take communion (it really did look like a cult to me at that time)  or sing the songs. I couldn't raise my hands anymore......it was gone...I knew in my heart I was done. That's when I found Ex-c and was probably one of the happiest days of my life....to know that I was not the only person who questioned the christian church.

Such a lot of nonsense, isn't it? So, did your former pastor ever get his 3,000 people church?

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It was Paul's books that did me in. I can't quite put my finger on what it was that was so unsettling to me about Paul. But I knew reading his books that he is not somebody I'd ever want to associate with. Very angry, dominating man, might as well have gone off on a crusade or something. I don't want to be like Paul.

i could never stand paul myself. what an angry dude, sexist, and very fanatical. definitely not someone i would want to have dinner with.

 

Before I de-converted, my father would sometimes talk about heaven and how great it will be. "You'll get to meet all sorts of cool people. Like Moses, and Abraham, and John, and Mary, and Elijah....and Paul!!!" I thought, "Ehhh....is it bad if I don't really want to see him?" Thank god that's not going to happen. I would probably get in trouble for having an argument with Paul and yelling at him. tongue.png

 

Yeah, I'd rather have a beer with Obama than a whole dinner with Paul. What a douche.

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It was Paul's books that did me in. I can't quite put my finger on what it was that was so unsettling to me about Paul. But I knew reading his books that he is not somebody I'd ever want to associate with. Very angry, dominating man, might as well have gone off on a crusade or something. I don't want to be like Paul.

i could never stand paul myself. what an angry dude, sexist, and very fanatical. definitely not someone i would want to have dinner with.

Before I de-converted, my father would sometimes talk about heaven and how great it will be. "You'll get to meet all sorts of cool people. Like Moses, and Abraham, and John, and Mary, and Elijah....and Paul!!!" I thought, "Ehhh....is it bad if I don't really want to see him?" Thank god that's not going to happen. I would probably get in trouble for having an argument with Paul and yelling at him. tongue.png

 

 

It really boggles the mind that Christianity is basically built around the Paul figure ... a guy who didn't understand Jesus, didn't understand Judaism, didn't understand other religions, didn't understand philosophy, hated women, knew nothing about the science of his day, etc. In other words, there is nothing admirable about this figure at all. 

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The last thing for me was Rick Warren's 40 days of purpose. As I attended these study groups it became more and more clear to me that Christianity was a world of fantasy and delusion. Nothing more. Yes, Rick warren had a hand in my deconversion!

I'm glad I'm not the only one who was not impressed with that book!  A friend and I tried to seriously go through it and do all the work together. We weren't particularly xian any more, but figured it would have some good insights into finding our "purpose."  As we got to the end, we were both so disappointed!  And we really tried.  It was pathetic --at that time churches were real big on doing that book as a bible study and everybody was so amazed at how it transformed their lives!  We were unimpressed, there was nothing in that book that we hadn't already thought about (and thought we were very deep!) in 8th grade.

 

Either your typical church-goer is pathetically shallow for never having thought of anything beyond an 8th grade level, or they just agree with whatever everybody says so they don't make waves because they just want to get out of there, or they are just truly sheeple.

 

 

biggrin.png 

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  • 2 weeks later...

 

Before I de-converted, my father would sometimes talk about heaven and how great it will be. "You'll get to meet all sorts of cool people. Like Moses, and Abraham, and John, and Mary, and Elijah....and Paul!!!" I thought, "Ehhh....is it bad if I don't really want to see him?" Thank god that's not going to happen. I would probably get in trouble for having an argument with Paul and yelling at him. tongue.png

 

Ok a-mum does the same conversation with me.  She doesn't possibly see why I wouldn't want to spend all day hanging out with Paul (who believe me I have absolutely nothing in common with) and of course theres that bastard David as well who stole another man's lady and then put the guy on the front lines in order to murder him.  The "man after gods own heart" well that says it all doesn't it.

 

It was even today I told a-mum once again that I don't want to go to this heaven she keeps telling me about.  She is dumbstruck every time I mean literally speechless that anybody would not want to go to this heaven she believes in where all these bastards hang out.  Presuming david is alive right now in heaven he's probably planning his next murder so I think hell must be safer

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