Was there a defining moment for you?

fitz0

Hmm like most I had no defining moent as such. I was actually quite religious when I was younger. I even considered becoming a priest... for about 2 weeks! Suppose I just started thinking round about the age of 17.
Started thinking one day about how if god (omnipotent, all powerful) supposedly created man in his own image, why was there greed, jealousy etc. If god saw all, then maybe god had these traits too and as such it all seemed a bit pointless. Unless he couldnt see ahead -> wasnt omnipotent -> not all powerful -> not really a god then is he/she/it? Not much of an arguement against a god but it got the ball rolling.

One thing though is that a lot of my friends and aquaintances say they believe in god and consider themselves Catholic but want no part in it. Bit of a contradiction I know but they want to keep being Cathlics with no mass, no confessions, no praying. They keep their Christmas though.

My brother in particular does this. When I first started voicing my atheism to my family he backed me up, agreed with me and even started doing his own reading about it. He pointed me to a few interesting things and I honestly thought he considered himself an atheist but no! He still says he believes in god, calls himself a Catholic etc. Now I have nothing against him being religious only he did all the leg work. He just couldnt give up the religious crutch. Maybe Im being petty but I just cant understand and now I think hes a bit weak for not going the whole way.

Galvasean

fitz0 wrote: »

One thing though is that a lot of my friends and aquaintances say they believe in god and consider themselves Catholic but want no part in it. Bit of a contradiction I know but they want to keep being Cathlics with no mass, no confessions, no praying. They keep their Christmas though.

Sounds like my family alright. In fact it sounds like most of the 'Catholics' I know. They only seem to be Catholic when its christmas or Celtic play Rangers.

Daemonic

Rojomcdojo wrote: »

And a big dick. Athiests have big dicks.

Really :eek:
****, I must believe in god after all

The Mad Hatter

Definite moment for me - sitting in a very long, very boring mass in the Friary in Sligo, at about twelve years old. I looked at the crucifix on the wall, and thought 'I've been told to think critically and examine evidence for everything, so why am I sitting here believing what I'm told without a shred of evidence?'

By the time mass was over, I was an atheist (though it was about another year before I ever heard the term).

That was it.

CPT. SURF

I suppose that atheism began to manifest itself in me when I was around 11 or 12 years old. All these groups of people going around believing that the vast majority of all human beings that have ever existed are burning in hell because they do not believe exactly what they believe. I thought that it must be very bad for a person's mental health to have images like that floating around in their head on a daily basis.

I took a few philosophy classes in my early college years and that was the end of any potential belief I might have had. The writings of Albert Camus had so much more meaning to me and made we want to squeeze the grape of life for every last drop that it is worth.

I felt an incredible sense of liberation when I knew I would never believe in God. Motivated and excited to make the most of my life and not spend my precious time here waiting to die. Waiting for a place that does not exist and giving up the place that actually does.

sdep

When I was four (yes, I know) I went to a nursery run by Catholic nuns - we'd just moved to London, and everywhere else was full, rather Biblically. At this time, my mother decided to hot-house us with a book on the Big Bang, the origins of the Earth, evolution etc. When the nuns gave us the Genesis version shortly after, I apparently regurgitated all this sciency stuff. They were not impressed. Anyway, after that I never really looked back.

At seven, I remember a trial of faith over school lunch when a girl demanded, 'Hands up who believes in God.' I dissented and the dinner ladies were informed, but all they did was saw that we finished our pudding and cleared out.

At some point, probably before I was 10, I got sent to Sunday School. There never seemed to be any religion around the house, so I guess it was to get shot of the kids on Sunday mornings. I always resented going, but the teachers didn't lay on the hard core stuff, and all we did was make those expanding newspaper palm trees - much more miraculous in the days of broadsheets - and bookmarks of some bloke called Zaccheus who slid up and down a tree.

I do vaguely remember experimenting with prayer when very young, but I never found anyone on the other end, and it was just another chore before going to bed; at least I could see the point of brushing your teeth.

Delirium

No. Just a growing mindset of questioning rules based on a religious stand point. Never really into religion growing up. Knew from about 12-13 it wasn't for me but had to spend many years banging heads with my dad before it was left up to me.

Xhristy

This post has been deleted.

The Mad Hatter

Sonderval wrote: »

In saying that, I find the meditation aspects of Buddhism very useful. Though I consider Buddhism more akin to a philosophy then a religion.

Definite ditto.

Though I also like the fact that the first rule of Buddhism is basically 'question everything.'

Zillah

Isn't it that desire causes suffering and to end suffering one must eliminate desire?

redfacedbear

It was a gradual process for me too, lasting from about 14yoa to 18.

I was raised a Catholic, but seeing as my father is an Atheist and my mother could be more described (at the time) as a Christian rather than a Catholic the only hard-core indoctrination I received was in school.

At 14 I began to critically look at what we were being taught and I had serious problems accepting some notions of Catholic Theology and practice - Transubstantiation, Papal Infallibility, Contraception, the status of women in the church, Original Sin, the Immaculate Conception & the Virgin Birth all caused me such doubts that I began describing myself as a Christian rather than a Catholic for a while.

I continued my exploration of my faith and continued to be unsatisfied by the answers that religion provided so by 16 I was calling myself Agnostic and by 18 I was an Atheist.

The Mad Hatter

Zillah wrote: »

Isn't it that desire causes suffering and to end suffering one must eliminate desire?

How is that a rule?

Is this even worth discussing?

Why is there a 'Turbo' button on my keyboard?

sink

The Mad Hatter wrote: »

Why is there a 'Turbo' button on my keyboard?

Must be old. IBM's in the late 80's / early 90's had a turbo function that would give you a speed boost.

rainbow kirby

I was never really comfortable with the ideas of religion, when I was very young all it meant to me was "that class where we get to use crayons that isn't called art". Started questioning a lot when I was about 9 years old, and around that time my grandmother was buying me the "Tree of Knowledge" part-work encyclopedia. I absolutely loved the science and nature parts of it and read them over and over again. By the time I was 11 years old and at Confirmation age, I was fairly certain there was no God, but went through with the whole thing for the money (like most kids!). As I went on to my teens, I started to read more feminist books and theory and realised that given the status of women in most organised religions I could never follow one - of course realising I was queer when I was 16 and knowing that most organised religions would condemn me for who I was didn't help matters! Also, the more science I read and studied, the more I was convinced that physics, chemistry, biology and mathematics explain the natural world far better than any religion ever could.

In short - functionally an agnostic at 9, atheist at 11-12 years old, still godless and happy at 24

deleriumtremens

like a lot of people, i didnt really think about or question religion until i was about 10 or 11, despite at that time knowing that we evolved from chimp-like ancestors and despite knowing the age of the earth and the universe! For some reason i didnt see the incompatibilities!
I was also well aware that catholicism was only one branch off of a general set of beliefs called christianity and that christianity was only one of many different religions, so the good old arguement of "why should my religion be any more correct than any other one" was just waiting to be thought about!!
So i was agnostic making my confirmation at the age of 12 but i still didnt really think much about it to be honest!
When i reached 13 though i noticed that ****ing everything us human beings like doing is a sin according to the bible so i wanted to believe that all that religious stuff wasnt true for my own good!! Also the thought of everasting life, in my opinion, was a sobering one!:)
Over the next 2 years my belief in anything supernatural kind of disappeared without me really noticing. I thought about some of the inconsitencies every so often. I thought about how for most of the worlds population, life is a daily struggle. I thought how for the vast vast majority of human history, life was horrible; people hadnt got as many morals as we do nowadays as they couldnt afford them in times of hunger, poverty and misery. Congenital diseases, how could a newborn child ever deserve that?
Over 2 years, I gladly peiced together in my mind little peices of info against the idea of a god.
I remember having to study for my junior cert religion exam when i was 15 and thinking "this is pointless learning this information!":p
But i only really became fully atheist at 16. I read "the god delusion" and seeing all dawkins' arguements in one place made me see more clearly.
I then read "the selfish gene" and my whole view of what life was and the purpose of it, as well as the reason why apparently selfless acts exist in nature, became more clear. I read a few more books after that by dawkins and another scientist called steven pinker that gave me a fully- rounded and godless view of the the world around me. Its not that i think about these things alot but its good to know the truth about these things, especially when you're just an 18 year old like meself!! :D I wont have any big scary ****ing doubts or anything to cower over when im dying, il just be going back to the way i was before i was born...free floating atoms!! :pac:

OK-Cancel-Apply

Yeah, at some point in my early teens I just thought, "Hey, there are lots of religions... why should the one I was born into be the correct one?? Hmm, you know what? I bet none of them are true..."

Of course, I never admitted my lack of belief to anyone. I probably didn't even know what an atheist was.

Years later, when I would let people in on the fact that I wasn't religious, I'd find them saying to me, "Well, surely you believe in something, yeah?". This began to p*ss me off. Some people would say, "Right, so you're an atheist then". I never really sought to find a new label for myself, but I suppose, in a world run on religion, we can't escape these labels.

Zillah

Whats wrong with labels if they're accurate?

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Zillah wrote: »

Whats wrong with labels if they're accurate?

They come with so much baggage. If so say you're an atheist, there are many who'd make a whole bunch of other assumptions about you. It would be better if we didn't have to call ourselves atheists. In a religion-free world, the term would be redundant.

Dades

OK-Cancel-Apply wrote: »

If so say you're an atheist, there are many who'd make a whole bunch of other assumptions about you. It would be better if we didn't have to call ourselves atheists.

It would be better if people understood the term, and didn't make assumptions!

OK-Cancel-Apply wrote: »

In a religion-free world, the term would be redundant.

That would be good alright. People wouldn't be atheists they would just be people. Unfortunately, knowing people there is always some other discriminating feature to use.

OK-Cancel-Apply

Dades wrote: »

It would be better if people understood the term, and didn't make assumptions!

That would be good alright. People wouldn't be atheists they would just be people. Unfortunately, knowing people there is always some other discriminating feature to use.

Yeah, I don't think it's that they don't understand the term - it's more that it sort of 'shocks' them, if you know what I mean. Some people are really rubbed the wrong way by the fact that others actually stand on the other side of the fence and assume that there is no god. See, most of the time, I don't feel like I am going around 'holding the position' that there's no god - I just don't care about it, or think about it one way or another (except when I come here of course! ) Religious people are the ones holding the beach ball underwater, so they should have all the labels IMO.

You know what? Next time I tell someone I'm not religious, and they ask/tell me (if) I'm an atheist, I'm just going to shrug and say, "I dunno".

lugha

No one moment as such, an ongoing journey. A problem that greatly impeded by conversion (and still troubles me) is that there are heaps of terribly bright folks who do believe. What do they see that I don’t?

anti-venom

They can't possibly 'see' anything more than anyone else. No matter how intelligent a person may be their belief in god has to begin and end with faith. There is no convincing argument they can forward that doesn't meet this stumbling block. No matter how sophisticated their knowledge of religious matters may be they still can't offer a shread of credible evidence to support their faith.

williamb

I spent a lot of time in Israel in 1997. The Holocaust is,shall we say, a pretty important topic in Israel. At one point I went to dinner at a colleague's house. His adorable 7 year old daughter was running around the house, being her charming 7 year old self.

At one point, late in the evening, after we'd been discussing the Holocaust, he picked her up and said "To think,men once conspired to put her in a gas chamber".

I came home, and read a lot about the Holocaust. And read about the mechanics of the gas chambers. Pregnant women were most likely to survive the actual gassing, for various physiological reasons. Sometimes those women would survive enough to give birth after the chambers were opened. Those women were shot in the head, their babies were throw,alive,into the incinerator.

Bavaria, the home state of Nazism, is largely Catholic, and was so in the 1920's and 1930's when they incubated Hitler.

I was an atheist before I read about the Shoah, but after I did, I was convinced that if the Christian God does exist, he's a paltry, inconsequential thing, unworthy of respect or attention.

Jannah

Rojomcdojo wrote: »

And a big dick. Athiests have #########.

aMEN! :P

Obni wrote: »

"Hey! If I'd been born in Israel I'd be Jewish, or if in Saudi Arabia I'd be a Moslem, or elsewhere a Hindu, or whatever, and my view of the world and my place in it would be so different. Lucky for me I was born in the one religion that was true among the thousands of beliefs that are complete nonesense. Wow, the right one among thousands and thousands and thousands, ... wait a minute...! :eek:

OK-Cancel-Apply wrote: »

"Hey, there are lots of religions... why should the one I was born into be the correct one?? Hmm, you know what? I bet none of them are true..."

These two statements pretty much sum up the reason I started to question everything- if millions of people believe in this and that, and really it's all a question of geography, it is that if you live in a certain place you're meant to be doomed?! What kind of logic is that? Obviously, if you think your religion is right, then everyone else is wrong- so hey, I'm just gonna put it on the table that everyon'e wrong!

username123 wrote: »

Asked a lot of questions in school - got no answers.

Yep- I have the exact same experience whenever I try to talk to my parents about religion. I'm convinced that people don't study too much into religion for fear of seeing something that doesn't add up and losing their blind faith.

anti-venom

Jannah wrote: »

aMEN! :P






Yep- I have the exact same experience whenever I try to talk to my parents about religion. I'm convinced that people don't study too much into religion for fear of seeing something that doesn't add up and losing their blind faith.

I was recently reading the God Delusion at work. A collegue of mine asked me what it was about. I explained as succinctly as possible and asked her if she would like to borrow it sometime. "Oh no, I'm afraid it work on me", she replied. They can't take chances on letting reason and truth slip in the back door it would appear.

lugha

anti-venom wrote: »

They can't possibly 'see' anything more than anyone else. No matter how intelligent a person may be their belief in god has to begin and end with faith. There is no convincing argument they can forward that doesn't meet this stumbling block. No matter how sophisticated their knowledge of religious matters may be they still can't offer a shread of credible evidence to support their faith.

The whole evidence thing is curious. Christians (or Catholics at least) seem to have two incompatible takes on it. On the one hand, blind faith is championed as a virtue for a believer but they also have their miracles and prayers and so forth which would amount to very persuasive evidence if they could be verified.
And they don’t always (or often) concede that there is an element of faith in their beliefs. Many would only admit to the same amount of doubt that atheists would have that there is no God. Which is not very much. I would genuinely love to understand their mindset.

Galvasean

anti-venom wrote: »

I was recently reading the God Delusion at work. A collegue of mine asked me what it was about. I explained as succinctly as possible and asked her if she would like to borrow it sometime. "Oh no, I'm afraid it work on me", she replied. They can't take chances on letting reason and truth slip in the back door it would appear.

Oddly I've heard a few people say this too. My response is usually, "Go on.. you might learn something."

kelly1

Interesting thread folks. Notable that Santa was mentioned a few times.

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kelly1 wrote: »

Interesting thread folks. Notable that Santa was mentioned a few times.

Speaking of Santa - my turning point there was probably when we moved to a house that had a blocked up chimney. The presents still came...

Also, the tooth fairy - now, I think Dawkins told a similar story to this, but one night, I pretended that my tooth had fallen out, as an experiment, and lo and behold, I still got 50p under my pillow the next morning. Mystery solved!

lugha

kelly1 wrote: »

Interesting thread folks. Notable that Santa was mentioned a few times.

Well no offense but its not entirely inappropriate to mention Santa here. For some of us the journey from believing in God to not has a good bit in common with a similar journey we took when younger involving Santa. Both involved lots of “hang on a second ….”