I perhaps had it easier than most. Actually, I’m quite sure I did. While my father took me to a Roman Catholic church when I was little- at least from the ages 7 to 10 -I never paid attention. Quite frankly at the latter stages, I was quite uncomfortable with the whole thing. Bored out of my mind for one and having to dress up in cloths that I never cared to wear. In fact, one time I asked my dad if I could bring a book on dinosaurs to read. You know, in case I got bored.
I later figured that my father was doing this solely at the behest of my grandparents. I’m not sure why he stopped going and thus my not going, but it was quite nice. The nightly prayers stopped too- what a bore those were.
My mom on the other hand had become Buddhist or perhaps had been for some time- I’m not sure. She would take me to weekly meetings and would have me sit with her at our home alter. Not only was I already bored with religion in general, but now it’s in a different language. Oh joy.
The weekly meetings were much more fun than the Catholic church. There were kids to play with, I could read whatever I brought with me, sometimes if it was held at someone’s house, they might have dogs for me to pet! Oh and I often had to do my homework. Never seemed to escape that. This too stopped being a common occurrence. Again I’m not too sure when, although I believe I was in the 6th grade. It was also around this time that I started to slowly learn about religion, but it wouldn’t be until High School that I really got into it.
My “indoctrination” into mocking religion came in the form of “No-God.com”. If you’ve never been and wish for a 90s flash-back, I highly recommend it. This website had a great mix of humor and facts. Very dark and twisted humor. Perfect for a high school student engrossed in all things Metal and GWAR.
GWAR, along with Marilyn Manson, led to some new websites and interesting people/ideas. The “Church of the Sub Genius” is one of them as well as the “Church of Satan”. Satanism is just as boring to me as Christianity, although at the time was certainly something fun to heat people up with in a hurry. Aside from cheesy websites and religions, I didn’t much pay attention to it all. In fact, I’m not sure I was too familiar with the term “Atheist” at the time. I believe my standard reply to the question of my religious affiliation was: “I don’t have time for any of that.”
After discovering Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens and PZ Myers, it became quite clear to me that Atheism was here to stay in my life. Not only that, but it helped me gain confidence in what I believed in and a confidence to be open and expressive about it. I feel very free about life and much more excited about the natural beauty of the world because of it.
Mike Bermudez
Fnord
We received exhortations to enjoy religion, which certainly helped a lot. One more thing to feel guilty about, not enjoying the excruciatingly stupid theological ramblings of Paul.
Glen Davidson
My questions would have to be these. Is it because church was actually boring to you and that is why you did not like religion? Was it because you did not see it lived out in front of you that you became an Atheist? Was it because your hormones took you away as a teenager? I found school boring when I was younger and that has not stopped me from pursuing my Masters. I just think this testimony is not at all thought out. I would respect it more if you actually searched instead of just doing the easy thing.
What part of Religion isn’t meant to be boring? It’s not intellectually stimulating; it’s rote memorization if any interaction at all.
Sadly, no-god.com seems gone…
Wow, Marilyn Manson positively influenced someone.
@kevinjones
My question would be: where did you get your master’s degree and in what field? It wasn’t at an English language institution, was it?
Q1 – unwieldy, rephrased to “Did you become an atheist just because church was boring?”
Apparently not, re-read the last paragraph.
Q2 – not what “it” is, assuming “Did you become an atheist as you didn’t have religious role models?”
religious role models were there, in the form of the father (until the break from the church) and mother.
Q3 – “took you away”? Really? Hormones take you places?
I wish your criticism had more thought and better grammar. I still wouldn’t respect it, not after the posting made on the Nones thread. Religion is superstition.
Church : where mom takes you so Dad won’t have to be woke up during his hangover.
*basement cat approve this message.
@WhiteHatLurker
In response to kevinjones you referred twice to his grammar issues. Can you provide a single example of bad grammar he used?
[OT + meta]
syggyx, “I just think this testimony is not at all thought out” → “I wish your criticism had more thought and better grammar”.
(I note you did not ask kevinjones to justify the claim which WhiteHatLurker is parodying)
Oh, so the grammar talk is just complete idiocy, as usual.
Just checking.