Being Human Or Being Christian

[GaudierGash]

Something that I've been pondering about and beating myself up about when it comes to the life I used to live and my life as a Christian is the needs of a human. Especially the sexual drive. Since I stopped watching porn, stopped masturbating, stopped having sex and all that jazz I've found myself much more sexually frustrated; staring at women (in a natural, non-creepy way, if there is such a thing), and basically thinking about sex all the time. Everytime a tought like that popped up I've hated myself for it, basically told myself "no, stop it, your thoughts are impure and evil", and at the same time there have been my old self saying "it's normal, you want sex, we all want sex, it's not your fault", as a very minor voice. Now, this second voice have grown lately and I've started doing some of those 'forbidden' things, which of course is exciting, but I'm so scared that I will get to me later and scare the shit out of me; that second voice trying to tell me about the unforgiven sin and such. These are not actual voices I'm talking about, rather two different intruding thought-patterns.

I've taken up contact with my former psychiatrist for appointments and medication, but it will be a while from now before anything happens. Any tips on what to do when these thoughts come creeping in; telling me about hell and unforgivable sins?

I should be clear about the fact that I haven't deconverted, I'm simply a very bad Christian with some serious doubts, as in I believe almost none of it. But I just can't seem to take that last step. Sometimes I think it's some kind of PTSD from being exposed to hell; a turning point in my life in terms of mental health, and that the last step would be for me to actually confront that very fear I was exposed to then. 

Just wanted to say, in the short time I've been here I've come to like this place, there seem to be some really friendly people around, and I just feel relieved that there isn't somebody telling me to go deeper into religion, with all sorts of tips and tricks that I feel so much smarter than to follow. The name is Dag. Nice to meet you all.

[Guest sylensikeelyoo]

Dag, you sound like you are in the very EARLY stages of deconversion. And it's okay. You are not a "bad" Christian. You are mindfucked from your religion and everything you are feeling is normal. Masturbation, sex, porn, all of that is normal. You shouldn't feel guilty or wrong about your sexuality or touching yourself or any of that. It is not "dirty" or "immoral" or "wrong" or "disgusting." Many of us here have struggled with this exact same thing. And the fear of hell is one of the most common struggles for all of us in our earliest deconversion stages. It's our biggest hurdle for the majority of us. Just read the materials people link for you, watch the videos, and just let knowledge ease your mind. It is NOT the devil trying to pull you from God. That's a defense mechanism religion has for the intelligent people who's bullshit-o-meter is constantly buzzing. It has a way of trapping even the smartest skeptics. It's that nagging feeling of OMG what of they are right? Well, let me ask you this. What of they are right, Dag? The Heaven and Hell dichotomy is fucked up no matter what. What do you wanna do in your afterlife? Burn in a torture chamber as a free man until you forget who you are, or worship in paradise as a slave until you forget who you are? Either way, the Christian God is a prick and he's evil and unworthy of our worship regardless of whether he's real or not. So if your fucked regardless, enjoy what you know you have, which is this life here. So have sex, beat off, and watch all the porn to your heart's content!

 

And welcome to Ex-C! Great to have you, sweetie!

[florduh]

Not to worry, Dag. There are "good" Christians who accept the ridiculous premise and abide by the dogma that has been added over the centuries, and then there are "thinking" Christians. Thinking Christians leave and become Ex-Christians!

[VacuumFlux]

I deconverted a while ago now, but sometimes I still find it comforting to hear people arguing for good things in Christianeze. Sometimes it makes me sad that that's still a thing, other times I find it hilarious that I still care about hearing the truth in my "heart language" (which is a term some missionaries use to explain why you should give them money to translate Bible stories into other languages).

 

So, while I encourage you to think things through and probably deconvert, I can also use christian words to tell you you're ok if that'll help. (Well, it'll be US, Baptist words.) You look at Genesis, and humans there are made in the image of god, called good, and then told to "be fruitful and multiply". The human sex drive was called "good" before the fall! The sin of Onan wasn't masturbating; it was greed. He used his dead brother's wife for his own physical pleasure, but then pulled out and refused to impregnate her and raise up an heir for his brother so that he could have all the inheritance to himself. Other than that, the bible really doesn't have much to say about satisfying your sexual urges outside of marriage, as long as you're not involving anyone else. (Speaking from outside of christianity, I'd say that it's fine to involve a willing, adult partner too!) And the bible was written in an era where people married young, where the infant mortality rate was high, where the human population was much smaller. Modern humans don't have such a need to reproduce, and marry a lot later, but the drive hasn't changed at all. It is much more ethical to take care of your frustration on your own than to be moping about it all day, resulting in trouble focusing on your responsibilities and trouble relating to women. Even if you think (and I'd disagree) that masturbating is bad, what's worse is the way your frustration is negatively affecting the rest of your life. Sometimes I think it would be much easier if I were asexual and just didn't have worry about this stuff, but I am a sexual being and taking care of those urges is part regular maintenance, just like bathing and eating and using the restroom.

[GraphicsGuy]

.... I just feel relieved that there isn't somebody telling me to go deeper into religion, with all sorts of tips and tricks that I feel so much smarter than to follow...

Ugh...my second counselor told me to do that. It fucked me up and kept me in the cult for another 1.5 years.

 

Dag, welcome to the forum, and let me just say that you're not broken and there's nothing wrong with you. You are trying to figure out how to live in this crazy world just like everyone else is. NO ONE has the right answers for you except for you. Yeah, you can seek advice from others, but you are ultimately the only one that knows what is right for you.

 

Whether you leave Christianity or stay in it, just make certain that it is the healthiest choice for YOU.

[amateur]

The sex drive is strong because if it weren't, there wouldn't be many people, or animals for that matter.  It's just normal.

 

Religious leaders know that, and know they can control people by controlling their sex drive.  Honestly, I can see that having sex with every random stranger you meet and are attracted to could have negative consequences with diseases and unwanted pregnancies, but people having consensual sex in a safe fashion is a healthy way to live.  Religious leaders have even turned sex into a thought crime with just "lust in your heart" being something to punish by god.  What could possibly be wrong with checking out a good looking woman or man in a not-creepy fashion?  What could possibly be wrong with masturbation?  Religion is about control.

 

Thoughts are not impure and evil.  Controlling people by telling them that their mere thoughts are crimes against god is impure and evil.

[GaudierGash]

Dag, you sound like you are in the very EARLY stages of deconversion. And it's okay. You are not a "bad" Christian. You are mindfucked from your religion and everything you are feeling is normal. Masturbation, sex, porn, all of that is normal. You shouldn't feel guilty or wrong about your sexuality or touching yourself or any of that. It is not "dirty" or "immoral" or "wrong" or "disgusting." Many of us here have struggled with this exact same thing. And the fear of hell is one of the most common struggles for all of us in our earliest deconversion stages. It's our biggest hurdle for the majority of us. Just read the materials people link for you, watch the videos, and just let knowledge ease your mind. It is NOT the devil trying to pull you from God. That's a defense mechanism religion has for the intelligent people who's bullshit-o-meter is constantly buzzing. It has a way of trapping even the smartest skeptics. It's that nagging feeling of OMG what of they are right? Well, let me ask you this. What of they are right, Dag? The Heaven and Hell dichotomy is fucked up no matter what. What do you wanna do in your afterlife? Burn in a torture chamber as a free man until you forget who you are, or worship in paradise as a slave until you forget who you are? Either way, the Christian God is a prick and he's evil and unworthy of our worship regardless of whether he's real or not. So if your fucked regardless, enjoy what you know you have, which is this life here. So have sex, beat off, and watch all the porn to your heart's content!

 

And welcome to Ex-C! Great to have you, sweetie!

You bring up some interesting thoughts... If they are right, though, and if the inconsistent view of God in the bible is right, well... If that's the case, I suppose the Christians will be happy and the lost miserable? Even if it means worshipping a diety 'til you forget who you are; according to the definition from that God, you will be happy? Or?

 

Thank you for the warm welcome.

 

 

I deconverted a while ago now, but sometimes I still find it comforting to hear people arguing for good things in Christianeze. Sometimes it makes me sad that that's still a thing, other times I find it hilarious that I still care about hearing the truth in my "heart language" (which is a term some missionaries use to explain why you should give them money to translate Bible stories into other languages).

 

So, while I encourage you to think things through and probably deconvert, I can also use christian words to tell you you're ok if that'll help. (Well, it'll be US, Baptist words.) You look at Genesis, and humans there are made in the image of god, called good, and then told to "be fruitful and multiply". The human sex drive was called "good" before the fall! The sin of Onan wasn't masturbating; it was greed. He used his dead brother's wife for his own physical pleasure, but then pulled out and refused to impregnate her and raise up an heir for his brother so that he could have all the inheritance to himself. Other than that, the bible really doesn't have much to say about satisfying your sexual urges outside of marriage, as long as you're not involving anyone else. (Speaking from outside of christianity, I'd say that it's fine to involve a willing, adult partner too!) And the bible was written in an era where people married young, where the infant mortality rate was high, where the human population was much smaller. Modern humans don't have such a need to reproduce, and marry a lot later, but the drive hasn't changed at all. It is much more ethical to take care of your frustration on your own than to be moping about it all day, resulting in trouble focusing on your responsibilities and trouble relating to women. Even if you think (and I'd disagree) that masturbating is bad, what's worse is the way your frustration is negatively affecting the rest of your life. Sometimes I think it would be much easier if I were asexual and just didn't have worry about this stuff, but I am a sexual being and taking care of those urges is part regular maintenance, just like bathing and eating and using the restroom.

Arguing for good things in Christaneze, what do you mean by that?

 

You bring up some interesting points, too... I suppose I haven't really put that much thought into what society was like then, which is weird for me.

 

I agree, it's like... it would be practically good to be asexual, but I don't feel like it, since the sex drive is powered by feel-good emotions. I'm bound to want it.

 

 

.... I just feel relieved that there isn't somebody telling me to go deeper into religion, with all sorts of tips and tricks that I feel so much smarter than to follow...

Ugh...my second counselor told me to do that. It fucked me up and kept me in the cult for another 1.5 years.

 

Dag, welcome to the forum, and let me just say that you're not broken and there's nothing wrong with you. You are trying to figure out how to live in this crazy world just like everyone else is. NO ONE has the right answers for you except for you. Yeah, you can seek advice from others, but you are ultimately the only one that knows what is right for you.

 

Whether you leave Christianity or stay in it, just make certain that it is the healthiest choice for YOU.

 

Why would a councelor do that? Was he religious himself?

 

Thank you, that feels good to hear. I've been struggling with this for six years now, I think I'm getting ready to accept that it's not for me.

 

The sex drive is strong because if it weren't, there wouldn't be many people, or animals for that matter.  It's just normal.

 

Religious leaders know that, and know they can control people by controlling their sex drive.  Honestly, I can see that having sex with every random stranger you meet and are attracted to could have negative consequences with diseases and unwanted pregnancies, but people having consensual sex in a safe fashion is a healthy way to live.  Religious leaders have even turned sex into a thought crime with just "lust in your heart" being something to punish by god.  What could possibly be wrong with checking out a good looking woman or man in a not-creepy fashion?  What could possibly be wrong with masturbation?  Religion is about control.

 

Thoughts are not impure and evil.  Controlling people by telling them that their mere thoughts are crimes against god is impure and evil.

True. It's like... If you believe what the religion says, it's all good somehow, but when you put it under scrutiny, with a scpetic view, it seems so incredibly manipulative I just want to punch someone in the tooth. I hate being controlled. Thought-crimes.

[GraphicsGuy]

Why would a councelor do that? Was he religious himself?

Oh yeah. I was a heavy-duty Christian, so I went to a Christian counselling centre, but their people weren't necessarily university educated (at that time).

 

I must admit that this place really learned the error of their ways though. That counsellor was eventually let go (among others) and they stepped up the practice so it is a REAL counselling centre now.

[Guest sylensikeelyoo]

Well Dag, I don't think I'd be happy. I don't know about you, but after an hour of praise and worship, I'm over it. I grow bored and restless and I wanna get off my knees, stop groveling, and do something else. Imagine being forced to grovel on my knees for all of eternity, telling God over and over again how awesome he is for not burning me for ETERNITY. How incredibly fucked up is that? I seriously doubt I would be "happy" in heaven. Over time, I would psychologically break down, leaving heaven no different than hell except for the time it took for me to get to that mental state. Sure, hell would get me there quicker. Merciless, unrelenting torture will get anyone to a state of psychological brokenness in a very short amount of time. But the Christian "heaven" will do the exact same thing over a period of time. So the end result is the same, although methods and time frames vary. Plus: I could NEVER enjoy heaven knowing that there are people suffering in endless torment and grisly violence. I could NEVER worship a deity who would do such a thing and be sincere about it. It's sick and demented and I especially could NEVER worship him knowing he's doing this to my family or my children or my husband or parents or my friends. Fuck that.

[Ellinas]

If god didn't want us to fulfill sexual urges, he would have made us without them.

 

We would reproduce via parthenogenesis.

 

That we are as we are indicates either that there is nothing wrong in these acts and that Christianity is false, or that the god who happens to make these rules is considerably less intelligent that the average human.

 

Either way, you have no reason to worry about scratching your sexual itch.

[VacuumFlux]

 

 

Arguing for good things in Christaneze, what do you mean by that?

 

Using Christian jargon to say non-christian things. It's part of what keeps christians "in the fold", having a language that makes no sense to outsiders, and makes it harder for outsider's arguments to make sense to christians. Having grown up in the church, gone to a christian school, and almost never meeting anyone non-churcy until college, Christian jargon is sorta my native language. I was surprised to discover how much it meant to me to read a "progressive" christian blog arguing that evolution is true, gays are ok with god, etc. They were all conclusions that I'd come to long before, but... some weight I didn't even know I was carrying left me when I heard a christian using evangelical christian terms to argue for these things. It's the same reason that there are christian missionaries busy translating the bible into all sorts of languages; they call people's native tongue their "heart language" and say that it's a lot easier to make converts when they hear stories in their first language.

[GaudierGash]

 

Why would a councelor do that? Was he religious himself?

Oh yeah. I was a heavy-duty Christian, so I went to a Christian counselling centre, but their people weren't necessarily university educated (at that time).

 

I must admit that this place really learned the error of their ways though. That counsellor was eventually let go (among others) and they stepped up the practice so it is a REAL counselling centre now.

 

Have you ever heard the idiom 'on a knife-edge'? I suppose you have. This is how I feel about Christianity when I read something like this... 'Christian counselling centre', to me, it's just like 'not actual counselling centre'.

 

Well Dag, I don't think I'd be happy. I don't know about you, but after an hour of praise and worship, I'm over it. I grow bored and restless and I wanna get off my knees, stop groveling, and do something else. Imagine being forced to grovel on my knees for all of eternity, telling God over and over again how awesome he is for not burning me for ETERNITY. How incredibly fucked up is that? I seriously doubt I would be "happy" in heaven. Over time, I would psychologically break down, leaving heaven no different than hell except for the time it took for me to get to that mental state. Sure, hell would get me there quicker. Merciless, unrelenting torture will get anyone to a state of psychological brokenness in a very short amount of time. But the Christian "heaven" will do the exact same thing over a period of time. So the end result is the same, although methods and time frames vary. Plus: I could NEVER enjoy heaven knowing that there are people suffering in endless torment and grisly violence. I could NEVER worship a deity who would do such a thing and be sincere about it. It's sick and demented and I especially could NEVER worship him knowing he's doing this to my family or my children or my husband or parents or my friends. Fuck that.

So am I. Well, I suppose you let yourself be brainwashed. Sometimes I think that's what Christianity is about; letting yourself be brainwashed for the sake of God. I actually believed that was the true path for a while, that's how far I've gone to make sense of Christianity. That thought is still lurking in my mind, and I think it's because so much of what Christ (or whomever wrote the gospels) taught was good. As in some of it would actually make a much better world.

 

Do you think you could be tortured for so long that you actually start liking it? It's a pretty dakr question, but seriously.

 

I don't like the thought either.

 

If god didn't want us to fulfill sexual urges, he would have made us without them.

 

We would reproduce via parthenogenesis.

 

That we are as we are indicates either that there is nothing wrong in these acts and that Christianity is false, or that the god who happens to make these rules is considerably less intelligent that the average human.

 

Either way, you have no reason to worry about scratching your sexual itch.

Or, according to some Christians, he did it so we would have to fight it to appease him; to show him how far we're able to go to follow his ways.

 

I sometimes wonder what I would be like if I actually embraced my sexual urges...

 

 

 

 

Arguing for good things in Christaneze, what do you mean by that?

 

Using Christian jargon to say non-christian things. It's part of what keeps christians "in the fold", having a language that makes no sense to outsiders, and makes it harder for outsider's arguments to make sense to christians. Having grown up in the church, gone to a christian school, and almost never meeting anyone non-churcy until college, Christian jargon is sorta my native language. I was surprised to discover how much it meant to me to read a "progressive" christian blog arguing that evolution is true, gays are ok with god, etc. They were all conclusions that I'd come to long before, but... some weight I didn't even know I was carrying left me when I heard a christian using evangelical christian terms to argue for these things. It's the same reason that there are christian missionaries busy translating the bible into all sorts of languages; they call people's native tongue their "heart language" and say that it's a lot easier to make converts when they hear stories in their first language.

 

This is very interesting to me since I've always thought that the way hardcore Christians speak is so foreign to me. I actually believe it is one of the things that haven't made me go head-full into Christianity yet; the way some speak almost seem mentally deranged to me. It is as if I can tell that some pastors just do it for the sake of manipulation. It seems so fake, but a lot of people listen and take it to heart. 

[Ellinas]

"I sometimes wonder what I would be like if I actually embraced my sexual urges..."

 

 

The answer to that is in your own power to discover.

[Castiel233]

 I've found myself much more sexually frustrated; staring at women (in a natural, non-creepy way, if there is such a thing),

"How's your love life?" "'Love life' may be a rather grandiose term for staring at women on the bus." Peep Show, Channel 4

[violetbutterfly]

Welcome. I highly suggest reading the book I have linked in my signature.