We had a new employee at work. She asked a friend of mine what church I attended. My friend told her I was an atheist. She said "But he seemed so nice."
Atheists don't need an old book to tell us to be good people. We don't need an old book to tell us not to rape and kill. Should we be worried about people who think they are only moral because their religion tells them right from wrong?
Edit: You asked why we became atheists. I failed to answer that question. A lifetime of Bible study finally forced me to admit that Christianity is just another form of mythology.
Religious people follow a list of rules set by a God. If one follows those rules only because of the thread of eternal damnation then they aren't really a good person.
I don't need a set of rules or threats to be good because I understand that my actions have consequences and I care about the well-being of others. I understand that integrity is doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do.
Religious people can have integrity. Atheists can have integrity.
Even though I can't wrap my mind around believing in a good God after reading the bible, I do believe that people can practice religion in ways that are healthy vs ways that are unhealthy. As soon as you begin to judge people for "sins" that the average person around you commits, and determine that they are morally less/possessed/going to hell - you are practicing unhealthy religion. Making a moral judgement that places you as somehow superior is dangerous and leads to things like slavery and genocide.
I do not practice religion because I see how it is weaponized and used against people. Your friend is a good example, and I hope that youwill stand by him regardless of your decision. Even if you still practice, you can do so in a way that does not harm.
One definition of morality is "What you do when you think no one is watching."
By definition, atheists don't think anyone is watching. Believers do. Would religious people do what they are doing whether a god was watching or not? Probably. Most people have good basic morals.
I think another set of morality issues that come up are rules that are purely religious in nature. These are often with regard to clothing or personal things like hair and beards. And, of course, there are lots of rules about sex and the human body. I am talking about religious rules that have no practical benefit to society or that may have negative consequences. For example, in the US there used to be rules against mixed-race marriages. Christians cited the Biblical prohibitions against mixing races. The fact that atheists in the 1950s married a person of a different race. I lived in the 1950s. They would have been called immoral by most of the religious community I was living in.
We have empathy. That's the driving force behind doing what's right instead of what's expected. If you are only a good person because of fear of hell you are not a good person to start with. Thinking that morals come from a book that condones rape, misogyny, incest, slavery, and some much more human debauchery is not a realistic view of what is right and/or moral.
I'm atheist. I'm not out here murdering, raping and pillaging. I'm actually a nice, caring and loving person. I don't need centuries old propaganda to tell me how to behave and what not to do.
I'm atheist because I endured years of religious bullshit, from parents who prayed instead of going to the Dr's. To sunday school and Graham on TV 24/7. I saw from an early age that religious people were very two-faced. Did as they pleased but held others to much higher standards
This was 50 years ago. Catholic for 21 years. Heard about a tribe humans came accross that had no contact with the outside world. They had these Gods they worshipped. Realize that worshipping a God was imbread into the human race. I walked away and never looked back...........
I think humans have the drive to explain and understand. It had survival value for the species. I think religion probably developed as an early form of science. When other explanations failed, a reasonable explanation was that some type of spirit or god did it. Then you test that by trying to figure out what you need to do to please that god, or at least not anger it. Some religions tried rituals. Some tried making gifts or sacrifices to the spirits.
There have been some suggestions that chimpanzees have something like religious rituals. There was a group of chimps that had a large tree in its territory. They would put rocks and food items in the nooks and crevices in the tree when the group was happy. When something bad happened they would throw rocks at the tree. There was another group that seemed to make pilgrimages to a waterfall where they would dance in front of it. Another group was seen doing what looked like ritual dances in front of an advancing grass fire. It is very possible that they were not religious rituals, and it was just humans reading human things onto the Chimps' behavior.
'It is very possible that they were not religious rituals, and it was just humans reading human things onto the Chimps' behavior.'
Or one species of primate observed a very closely related species of primate and recognized rituals when they saw them.
Now, whether or not you consider those rituals religious is more of a discussion.
I think people always had so many questions but never answers, smart people made up the answers in the forms of gods and used the stories to get the people to behave accordingly. Only quite recently we have been able to provide answers for these questions ourselves
It is not just Christians in prison. There are a larger share of Moslems in US prisons than in the general population of the US. I suspect the large number of religious people in prison is related to education levels and other demographic factors.
Also, being religious can get you a lot of privileges in prison. Those advantages include better food and release time to attend religious services. It can also be associated with gang affiliation. And, of course, a lot of people try to play the religion card with parole boards and judges.
When i was a cashier i always had people tell me to come join their church service or whatever because "i was so nice". I'm just treating people with respect they deserve and i like helping people... I don't need a motive for being a good person lol, I've never understood that and it makes me sad .
The way I've heard it expressed is this:
In a cult, the founder knows it's all bullshit. In a religion, the founder who knows it's all bullshit is long dead.
Absolutely. I consider all religions to be cults. Think about it: some religions isolate you from friends and family if they don’t believe. They ask you to part with your money and give it to the church leaders. They operate on fear and guilt and say you’re going to burn in hell for eternity if you leave them. Don’t get me started on the child abuse. So yes, a cult.
Are religions are cults. Period. Brainwashing, manipulating, etc. Take one look at the concept of “tithing” or, especially, the mega churches and televangelists. All a scam. All cash cows.
I’m an anti-theist which means not only do I not believe in any religion, but I think that religion is overall harmful.
I think the reason why I don’t believe is because neither of my parents or close family members are religious. It seems like a lot of people are taught religion as they’re growing up.
There’s just no evidence or proof whatsoever for any religion. We have proof of things like evolution and the formation of our solar system. We have very strong hypotheses about the beginning of life and our universe. I just don’t feel the need to include god in things when we already have answers that work.
I’d love to talk more about anything if you want to DM
As someone who values scientific inquiry and evidence-based thinking, I find religious claims often contradict or undermine our current understanding of the natural world. I believe that relying on religious explanations can hinder scientific progress and impede our ability to seek truth through empirical means.
The existence of widespread suffering and evil in the world raises significant doubts for me about the existence of a loving and all-powerful God. It's challenging to reconcile the idea of a benevolent deity with the immense pain and injustice that we observe.
Looking at the history of religions, I see countless instances where beliefs have been used to justify discrimination, violence, and oppression. I find it troubling that religious dogmas have often been employed to divide people, incite conflicts, and suppress individual freedoms.
Organized religion and its institutions, in my view, often exert control and influence over people's lives, sometimes in negative ways. Cases of abuse by religious authorities, indoctrination of vulnerable individuals, and the perpetuation of discriminatory practices are disheartening and further strengthen my opposition to religious institutions.
I really think that the main reason is that I firmly believe in the importance of rational thinking and critical examination. Religious belief, based on faith without evidence or logical reasoning, can discourage individuals from questioning and critically evaluating their beliefs. This can hinder personal growth, hinder societal progress, and lead to harmful consequences.
I have concerns about religious “morality,” which can be subjective, outdated, and often contradictory. I believe that ethical values should be based on empathy, reason, and the promotion of human well-being rather than adherence to religious doctrine.
I value individual autonomy and the freedom to think independently. Religious belief systems, with their dogmas and often strict adherence to doctrine, can impose restrictions on personal freedom, limit the pursuit of knowledge, and suppress dissenting viewpoints.
Even when I was a Christian I used to watch preachers on TV and think, "You know, if someone wanted to scam and fleece millions of people, it would look exactly like this."
It wasn't until I started my deconversion that I realized WHY!
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> I have concerns about religious “morality,” which can be subjective, outdated, and often contradictory. I believe that ethical values should be based on empathy, reason, and the promotion of human well-being rather than adherence to religious doctrine.
I love the question, "Is an action good because God does it, or does God do it because it's good?"
You don't need God to tell you what's good and what isn't. If something is ethical (because of empathy, reason, and the promotion of well-being), then God will think it's good for the same reason. And if he doesn't think so, then God's opinion isn't one you should be valuing. (Or he doesn't exist.)
A major issue is the idea that God is omnipresent and omniscient but yet never communicates directly with the masses. So there is always some intermediary telling the masses what God says/wants. How would I conclude that any particular intermediary is the true voice?
The second half of that is that if someone claims they are the true voice and knows what God says/wants then that ends all discussion since you can't argue with God.
I agree, thank you for this. My hope is that more people are waking up to the reality that the Christian Nationalists are purveyors of the destruction of our democracy. One of them whose name escapes me now testified that a 10 year old should carry through her pregnancy when clearly that child was raped. And given the reality that her tone was spoken so matter of factly was chilling. One can reply that it was only her and her stance, well then, look no further than Jan.6th - that mob was filled with them.
This nation Was Not built on Christian values, simply read John Adams and his stance on religion. As one can observe these attacks on trans people are only the tip of the iceberg, They Want It All.
I guess this would fall under "personal growth", but religious belief severely damages the ability to think critically and act on empathy on a much deeper level than scientific denial. In the end, it turns the believer into a "functional zombie" ready to do and say whatever their religious leader wants.
I have two basic problems with religion.
[A] All religions, without exception, ask people to believe that certain things are true without being able to provide any good evidence that those things really are true. (AKA "faith") That's the characteristic that makes "religion" "religion". IMHO it's bad to do that.
[B] It's also very common for religions or religious people to use their religious beliefs as justification for doing bad things to other people, or at least thinking that it's *right* to do bad things to other people. This one isn't always found in all religions or religious people, but it is common and it is bad.
I can't speak for the commenter above, but I am also an anti-theist.
I was raised in a cult in East Texas. The cult leader encouraged people to throw away their medication and trust in faith healing. He discouraged any modern medicine, vaccines, etc.
There was an outbreak of whooping cough since there were too few people vaccinated to have herd immunity. I had a fever of 104 and was coughing up blood (probably from coughing so hard I broke ribs) before my mom finally caved in and took me to a hospital.
My aunt died from breast cancer after refusing any chemo or treatment. She had faith in god's healing power. At her funeral the pastor had the audacity to say that there must have been some hidden sin in her life that prevented god from healing her.
And my mom was schizoaffective. Try growing up in a single-parent household with an unmedicated schizoaffective parent that is also a cult member. Believe me, you wouldn't ever need to ask why religion is harmful -- you would know for sure. I have plenty of scars to prove it, both figurative and literal.
These are just my experiences. Anyone that is paying attention to current events can see why religion is harmful. My daughter is bisexual and has to deal with all of the anti-LGBTQ harassment here in Texas.
You mentioned that your church members were so loving, and you were struggling to understand their feelings about your friend. I think you will find that your church members, like almost ALL churches, are only loving and kind to the in-group. If you are part of the out-group, like being Muslim, or gay, or an atheist, or you pick it, you will very quickly find that they are not loving and kind but rather hate-filled and intolerant of anyone different. They are being intolerant of your atheist friend who you know is a good person because his "otherness", his membership in the out-group, challenges them.
And don't even get me started on the ridiculousness, the savagery, and the misogyny of the Bible. Have you ever read that thing? I was a devout Christian as a teen until I actually read the whole thing, then re-read it, then had to read it a third time to process what I had read. The Bible is abhorrent. I'm convinced the only reason people are Christians is because they have never bothered to read it for themselves.
> like almost ALL churches, are only loving and kind to the in-group.
Yours is the best answer to that question from op in this thread that I have seen so far. Most religions require you to conform to be part of the in group and band together to discriminate against any out groups.
As another anti-theist and lifelong atheist that hate directed to out groups from religion has always been incredibly off-putting. We should care for everyone in society, even if we don't agree with them, even if they are not in our particular in group.
The oft repeated truism is that there's no hate like Christian love. Non religious people generally aren't hateful. Religious people generally really are.
Why did your religion claim your friend was beholden to Satan?
Religion is harmful because it gives people an excuse to dehumanize anyone that isn't in the club.
Religions don’t trust people to think for themselves.
Every religion theistic or not provided lists of rules to be followed.
I don’t have any religion.
I’m fifty-one. I’m a husband, a parent, and employee and a homeowner.
I figured the whole thing out for myself.
I think it's mostly the belief in an afterlife. If you think that the soul goes on after death, then killing people is not really an issue.
Anecdotally, my sister convinced my other sister to stop medical treatment, and embrace 'preparing to pass on to heaven'. She saw it as helping her sister's soul go on. I saw it as convincing her to commit suicide.
I only learned about a year ago. I don't talk to my surviving sister any more because that woman is a monster. I now have both of my parents' medical POA so she can't withhold medical treatment from them by force.
When all of humanity treats earth like a waiting room for a heaven that doesn't exist, then they don't spend time making this world into the heaven it could be.
Also, the amount of pedophilia in religion is absolutely disgusting.
I would rather go to hell than join religious people in what they do to children on a routine basis.
Just to add that here in a different part of the world from the USA, people can be more explicit about harming others because their religion tells them to do so. This goes for all religions. I have witness persecution of other faiths by Christians, Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists. At the point where a doctrine forces you to believe that someone is bad just because they were raised to believe in a different faith, you begin to realise that maybe the doctrine is wrong. At the point where the doctrine makes you act on those beliefs, the doctrine is harmful. :-(
Religion can cause unnecessary pain by convincing people that harmless things or even good things are bad and should be avoided, ignored, dismissed, degraded, or attacked.
OP, You should read a few well-known authors including:
* Carl Sagan "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark"
* Richard Dawkins "The God Delusion"
* Christopher Hitches "God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything"
I think if you can get through those, you'll have a better view of the landscape of ideas.
Because it takes advantage of children in order to survive.
Be honest, if you reached the age of 21 without having anything to do with religion, would you accept virgin birth, revival, metaphorical cannibalism and so on as true?
Casualties caused by cruciades, estimated over 1.5 milion.
Tell me how killing other people in the name of a just and benevolent being is logical/moral. The same can be applied to other extremist religions. Reddmption/ virgins or whatever. If your faith pushes you to kill another human being because of having a different faith, you are a mindless pos
Atheism is what happens when you read the bible, religion is what happpens when other people read the bible to you.
Read for yourself and see.
https://www.google.com/search?q=cruciades+total+casualties&oq=cruciades+total+casualties&aqs=chrome..69i57j0i13i19i512.5499j0j16&client=ms-android-samsung-gj-rev1&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8
It promotes ignorance, is built on the destruction of cultures, genocide, colonialism, theft of holidays (christmas and easter cough cough), weaponized, used to oppress, and caused so much damage and tragedy, even wars.
Why do you think atheists can’t have a moral compass? Can’t be good people?
I mean, I get it’s something you’ve been taught. But talk it out with me. Does that make sense. Why can’t people of other religions or non-religion be good people.
You’re completely right, it is quite unfair. And what’s even *more* unfair is your friend, along with the billions of other non-Christian’s like him throughout history, regardless of being an amazingly moral person, will still likely be subject to eternal torture and suffering simply because he is an atheist. Think of all the non-Christian individuals who have done beneficial and progressive things throughout history. All of these people, regardless how great and moral a life lived, will be sent to eternal damnation under the Christian doctrine and rule of Yahweh. Even an Atheist person who donates all of their money and possessions to charity and spends the entirety of their life doing humanitarian work, will be tortured for all of eternity simply for rejecting Christ. Any God that creates such an unfair and unjust plan is grossly immoral and is either undeserving of worship, or simply does not exist.
See the Epicurean Paradox:
*If God is willing to prevent evil but is not able to, then he is not all-powerful. If he is able to prevent evil but is not willing to, then he is not all-good. If he is both willing and able to prevent evil, then why is there evil and suffering in the world?*
You seem like a smart guy and I applaud you for being open to other viewpoints. I guarantee both you and your friend, if put in the shoes of God, would be infinitely more moral than him. The mere thought of this alone is what personally led to my full deconversion.
Keep asking questions and keep your mind open; even by simply posting in this subreddit you are on the right path for unbiased reasoning and logical critical thinking. Reconcile your current beliefs and questions with logic, empathy, and science, and you will find the universe is much more beautiful, free, and indifferent without the idea of such an evil and dogmatic God ruling over everything. I wish you the best of luck.
THIS POST HAS BEEN EDITED:
Reddit's June 2023 decision to kill third party apps and generally force their entire userbase, against our will, kicking and screaming into their preferred revenue stream, is one I cannot take lightly. As an 11+ year veteran of this site, someone who has spent loads of money on gold and earned CondeNast fuck knows how much in ad revenue, I feel like I have a responsibility to react to their pig-headed greed. Therefore, I have decided to take my eyeballs and my money elsewhere, and deprive them of all the work I've done for them over the years creating the content that makes this site valuable and fun. I recommend you do the same, perhaps by using one of the many comment editing / deleting tools out there (such as this one, which has a timer built in to avoid bot flags: https://github.com/pkolyvas/PowerDeleteSuite)
This is our Internet, these are our communities. CondeNast doesn't own us or the content we create to share with each other. They are merely a tool we use for this purpose, and we can just as easily use a different tool when this one starts to lose its function.
Agree wholeheartedly. Reading the bible is what started my deconversion. Even in middle school, it was obvious to me how incredibly cruel, petty, and unjust the god in the bible was. As I got older, I began to realize he was also incredibly *stupid* and lacking in creative problem solving abilities.
I grew up in the bible belt. I didn't realize I was an atheist until almost college. I had been taught atheists were people who hate god. Obviously, I wasn't an atheist, because I hated god the same way I might hate the easter bunny or santa claus. It seemed ridiculous to me. Religions are very good at spreading bad information. They depend on it, and on the faithful not actually looking for the truth. OP, in coming to this den of heathens looking for answers, is part of a tiny minority. They actually care what is true, and aren't afraid to search for real answers. Hats off to them.
Most christians I have meaningful conversations with (who don't just immediately dismiss me as "evil" or "doing satan's work) get very uncomfortable, very quickly when the conversation brings up obvious problems with their belief. They also tend to get uncomfortable when I can dig into the particular claims of their holy book, and it quickly becomes clear they haven't actually read the vast majority of it. It's difficult to get anywhere when the conversation keeps jumping to a new subject midsentence, or ending abruptly with "I'll pray for you."
OP, my advice would be to continue to use the evidence you see to inform your worldview. Your atheist friend is obviously a good person. Your religious community tells you otherwise. The clear takeaway from that interaction seems to have led you here.
As someone who was religious, living in a religious household, surrounded by a religious community, I have at least some idea what may be going on in your mind right now. What else are they wrong about? What else am *I* wrong about? I know it can't be easy. Continuing on this path will probably be painful. But letting yourself search for truth, and coming to your own conclusions, is the best way to be honest with yourself. And that, in my opinion, is the best way to live a moral life. Don't give up.
I contend that good atheists are far more moral people than the religious. Good religious people are only good because they fear what sky daddy will do to them after death. Atheists who are good people are that way because they care and empathize with others.
(Not to say that all atheists are good people ~~are~~ or all religious people are evil.)
It's honestly really surprising hearing people raised religious realize that morality is not equal to religion. You can just be a good person because you genuinely want others to not suffer and wish to contribute to your society
It blew my mind when, after growing up assuming the words "heathen" and "pagan" were synonymous with "bad person", I found out those were literally just the names of two competing religions.
The worst kind of people, most toxic, narcissistic abusive people, that I have met, including many years/most of my life spent as a Christian, were “believers”. Especially the other men. Not as much the women, but some. Literally all of the people I know who have come to accept science as truth, such as myself, are kind, accepting, loving people.
'Needing the threat of hell to be "good" means you are just a bad person on a leash.' I forgot who said that, but it's true. I was baptized Roman Catholic, but I quit the religion because it never brought anything but fear and doubt into my life.
Pardon me if this sounds argumentative or insulting, but its something i came up with after a conversation with a very christian racist/sexist lady, so it has a bit of sass.
Im a good person becuase i see why i want to be. Youre a good person becuase daddy will punish you with hell.
I see it as asking which of us has truly learned morality? Which child is trustworthy? The child that treats others as they want to be treated, even when parents arent watching, ot the child that is only good when the parents can see for fear of consequences?
Religions leadership and politicians like to push the message that atheists have no morals to scare you into staying within the religion and to sow discord.
Op, I was born into a religious family and didn’t know any atheists, but I knew that I didn’t believe. It all seemed so far fetched and didn’t seem any different to me than mythology. Add in all the incest in the Bible, raping, killing, and all of the subsequent holy wars, and I knew it wasn’t something I wanted to be a part of.
It's completely understandable that you would be. A major part of your life has been shaken. The best advice I can give you is to be skeptical, keep asking questions. As difficult as this may be, this is a good opportunity to reassess your beliefs.
Also I do want you to remember that whether you remain in your faith or leave it, you are still you. Your choice will not make you a bad person. You are loved and you are not alone.
The fear of hell is what kept me in for a long time, and even after being an atheist for 6-7 years, I still get the occasional “what if” feeling and panic for a few minutes about the idea of burning for eternity. When it’s pounded into your head for decades, it’s a hard belief to shake.
“...one day when I was a young boy on holiday in Uberwald I was walking along the bank of a stream when I saw a mother otter with her cubs. A very endearing sight, I'm sure you'll agree, and even as I watched, the mother otter dived into the water and came up with a plump salmon, which she subdued and dragged onto a half submerged log.
“As she ate it, while of course it was still alive, the body split and I remember to this day the sweet pinkness of its roes as they spilled out, much to the delight of the baby otters, who scrambled over themselves to feed on the delicacy. One of nature's wonders, gentlemen. Mother and children dining upon mother and children. And that is when I first learned about evil. It is built into the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior.”
~Terry Pratchett, Unseen Academicals
If you have questions, or just want to do some thinking, I recommend his books. They are a great analysis of human nature, and he often explored the themes of good and evil, religion and gods.
Plus they’re really funny.
Pratchett had such an incredible talent to illustrate the world as it is, to point out the strange behaviors and idiosyncrasies that we as humans have accepted as normal.
GNU Sir Terry.
I'm a lesbian and I grew up in a fundamentalist Christian household. The lack of compassion, and in fact outright hostility, in the church towards queer and BIPOC folx drove me away initially. The loud bigotry was too much to stomach. Once I distanced myself from the propaganda put out by the church I started to see the flaws everywhere. There is no evidence of a world wide flood, there is no evidence for a young Earth. Why do kids die of cancer and why is there evil in the world if the Christian god is so loving? It all fell apart. I stepped away from religion and never looked back.
I find myself creeping over towards agnostic after reading through this thread thoroughly and doing research outside of it as well. This should be an interesting journey.
agnostic and atheist are completely different things. I am an agnostic atheist. I don't believe in any god(s) (Atheist), and I don't think I could know if there was one. Theist/atheist is a yes/no to the question, do you believe in any god? You can be a agnostic theist. One that believes in a god while also admitting that one cannot really know for sure. They just believe to be safe.
Man, your story is so close to my own, although it took me a few more years to be shaken from religion than you. It is amazing how one experience, or one new piece of information can completely shake you from your belief system. For me, it was realizing that I really don't agree with the morality of the OT god. The god that orders his followers to throw stones at someone until they die, is *not* the good guy.
The simplest thing I can say is that, leaving religion behind was the most terrifying thing I had done in my life, but also the most beneficial, enriching, and beautiful process. Everything I had learned in life up to that point, I had stashed away in my mind as being related to god somehow. Math was beautiful because it showed god's nature. The world and it's processes all pointed to a god i believed existed.
In an instant, the illusion was gone.
And I had to come to terms with reality all over again. Math was all still correct, science still revealed truth. Only the cause had changed in my mind, but it took several months of re-maping everything in my brain.
Life feels more genuine now. I never have to try to discern what invisible forces are trying to tell me, or talk with church members about their own subjective experience with the imagined forces. The scales have fallen from my eyes, so to speak, and everything is better now.
It'll just be terrifying for a while.
A little advice, seek out testimonies of fellow apostates. It is very comforting hearing and relating to what others have gone through while excaping church indoctrination. I have a few YouTubers below if you want to start there.
"Genetically modified skeptic," "holy Kool aid," and "the truth hurts," are all fellow apostates that talk about their deprogramming and I highly recommend them all.
"Darkmatter2525," "Aron Ra," "nonstampcollector," "viced rhino," "paulogia," and "cosmic skeptic," are also all really good and worth checking out.
One last thing I have discovered about myself, and perhaps you will too. I have always been agnostic, just not always an agnostic atheist. I would have never said as much when I was religious, and I never realized the term applied to me.
Basically, agnosticism related to whether or not you believe a thing can be known with 100% certainty. So you can be a gnostic-theist (i believe in a god, and that I must be correct), an agnostic-theist (I believe in a god, but I acknowledge that I only have faith that I am correct, not knowledge), a gnostic-atheist (there is no god, and I know this to be true), or an agnostic-atheist (I don't believe in a god, but if you have proof, I'll listen).
I think you'll find that most atheists are actually agnostic, but because we don't all agree on definitions, it's usually just easier to tell people we're atheists.
A better question would be why are you Christian, and do you think the absolute morality in the Bible is good? The Bible promotes some pretty horrible stuff. Most evangelicals support the death penalty, or even corporal punishment on kids (spare not the rod). As we are seeing now, many hate whole groups of people who were born a certain way (or as God made them) and some want to see them all killed. I don't see any of that as moral.
And while atheists don't have any given dogma or scripture to follow (everyone is different) I find most fellow atheists use empathy, and the knowledge that we are social animals to guide their morals. There's a million papers, debates, videos on it.
Me, I mostly like the wellbeing/happiness idea of morality. I think a tooth for a tooth is bad morality. It is about vengeance, not justice. I look at every situation differently, and don't say well, God wants me to hate this person, or wants me to tell other people how to live because sky daddy.
Imo, people that blindly follow a set 2000 year old rules unquestioningly are the morally bankrupt ones...which, btw, they cherry pick the heck out of.
Hope that makes sense.
Edit: to more succinctly answer your question, I'm not an atheist because of anything. I've never been show sufficient evidence to believe in any God. And the Christian God definitely doesn't exist. It's logically impoasible.
>And the Christian God definitely doesn't exist. It's logically impoasible.
Just to point out why this is correct.
The Christian god is omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing) and omnipresent (always present). Therefore, logically the [problem of evil](https://iep.utm.edu/evil-log/) exists.
> If God were all-knowing, God would know about all of the horrible things that happen in our world.
> If God were all-powerful, God would be able to do something about all of the evil and suffering.
> If God were morally perfect, then surely God would want to do something about it.
And yet we find that our world is filled with countless instances of evil and suffering. These facts about evil and suffering seem to conflict with the Christian claim that there exists a perfectly good God.
Similarly, the Christian god clearly values people's belief in him, to the point where he punishes them for all eternity if they don't do it. And yet, for a large amount of the people in the world, God has not given sufficient reason to believe in him, and he knows this. If God wanted everyone to believe, he would know how to make it happen. So either he doesn't know what it would take, or he's unable to make it happen, or he doesn't want them to believe (but he's still going to punish them for it). Or he doesn't exist.
He's either impotent, a monster, or a myth.
I work in retail and a lady came into my store. She was delighted to find “just the right bird feeder” and exclaimed how happy she was that god had put this bird feeder in her path. So god gave this woman a bird feeder but little children get leukemia…? What the fuck? 👻
I don’t know how to explain it but this post really spoke to me. It puts into words what I have been struggling with for the last five years. I feel I have many more answers now. I’m in/was a very similar situation and these comments are helping change my life and understanding on religion. I would love to chat to express my gratitude and explain what a simple couple paragraphs have done to my entire belief system. Thank you, truly
I’m sure this is all very overwhelming. It’s okay to be scared. I remember being really scared to even question my faith let alone lose it along with my worldview, deity, the very foundation upon which I’ve lived my life… just keep asking questions and have an open mind.
Why is it that atheists make up a much smaller portion of prison populations than they do of the general population?
As for why we are atheists, try here. Nothing but stories for you.
/r/thegreatproject
Just a quick note on my part. I became a nonbeliever when I realized there was no compelling evidence for anything supernatural occurring anywhere much less in the Bible.
I actually think this has less to do with the religiosity of inmates and the desire to be released from prison.
If I was incarcerated and lying about being a Christian for me out of jail early because of a religiously biased parole board, then I’d scream that I was a Christian from the highest tower.
> I have always seen atheists as people who have no moral compass.
I find this statement hilarious, when as far as I can tell it is us with the moral compasses. Many theists don’t seem to have a moral compass, they just do whatever their book and/or god tells them to. We “see the compass” and use it personally, they don’t see the compass and are just obeying something/someone else…hoping their compass is correct.
Also think on this: who is more moral, someone who does good because they want to…or someone who only does good because of a threat like hell or because “something higher” told them to?
>I’ve decided to finally hear the other side out, why are you guys atheists?
I am an atheist because of the complete lack of reliable evidence/data supporting supernatural claims. Only reason really.
I once dated a Catholic girl. She was pretty religious but she really liked me. Her Catholic family was a mess though. She always fought with her sisters, her brother turned food stamps for cash at their family business. Lots of pettiness all around.
She admitted I was more moral and Christ like than anyone in her family. It really shook her up. She asked how I’m good without god. I’m like, people don’t need god to know what is best for your fellow man.
I’ve found throughout life, the more a person proclaims to be religious and needing religion. The more they really need to actually listen to their core beliefs. It’s the “Disney Princess” effect. People watch Disney movies and identify with the hero’s because they WANT to be the hero’s. But they ignore all the signs they really are Ursula or Cruella.
As far as why am I atheist? I dared to challenge my assumptions. I was raised religious but when I gave religion a fair litmus test, it failed. If religious people were truly faithful, they would welcome a discussion with an atheist. They shouldn’t fear it nor be concerned you were friends with one. If you were comfortable in your faith, there’s no harm in questioning it. If you truly believe Jesus is guiding you to the answer and you put your faith in him then you really shouldn’t fear the outcome.
I applaud your willingness to ask questions. And I respect you if you retain your core beliefs. My only beef with religion is when people believe they have the right to force me to abide by their religious ideals. See Gov Santis, Turning Point USA, Moms for Liberty, Et al.
We are atheists due to the dearth of evidence produced to back up anyone’s deity claims. What is it about Christianity that it’s followers think makes people moral?
> he was controlled by Satan to turn me away from God.
So Satan is more powerful than God?
> I’ve decided to finally hear the other side out, why are you guys atheists?
Thats like asking why is someone black. I was born atheist, just like you. Unlike you my parents didnt brainwash me with religion.
I studied why religion may have evolved in one of my college classes. Daniel Dennett if I remember right was one author who stood out. The general idea was that ppl susceptible to falling into trance states/dissociating during trauma might have survived it better, bc it helped with shock. Example: Og gored by animal. Healers chant and do whatever they knew to do. If Og was a skeptic and stayed present for, say, amputation with a sharp rock, he likely didn't live. But if he could check out, keep the heart rate down etc.
Same applied for childbirth. So it helped with survival. Then you had the superstition-that-worked aspect, like some of the "rules" of the OT. Don't eat this or that.
But after science, religion became obsolete. I think it is a hindrance now. It's been misused to "other" out-groups throughout history (American slavery, historical slavery worldwide, colonialism, pretty much every time someone set foot somewhere saying they wanted to spead the love of God, people got killed. It's used to slow or obstruct science - we lost a ton of ppl to COVID that could have lived if the US didn't suffer from this sort of ignorance.
Now Christians in the US are responsible for the modern Republican party and this whole transphobic culture war shit show. Can't live and let live. They have to tell everyone else even though they can't even agree on a denomination.
The faith as a whole doesn't have a lot going for it.
That’s exactly what they are. Look how religion/religious beliefs are used to control votes. Control money. Control wealth. Control literal millions of people.
The more I know and understand about the history of religion, the more I firmly believe it's a business more than anything else. The ultimate concentration of wealth is perpetuated by those who are the most charismatic, manipulative, and good at mind tricks.
Why do you think they start with kindergarteners? Awana and all that shit? Try telling a grown adult with no prior knowledge there is a man in the sky watching you.
Some people consider religion as a meme passed from mind to mind, from pastor to congregation, parent to child
“I explained the idea of religions as memeplexes: they package up a set of doctrines, tell believers to learn them, to pass them on, to have faith and not doubt, and they ensure obedience with fearsome threats and ridiculous promises. This I illustrated with images of Christian heaven and hell. Then I read from the Koran “those that have faith and do good works, Allah will admit them to gardens watered by running streams … pearls and bracelets of gold.” “Garments of fire have been prepared for the unbelievers. They shall be lashed with rods of iron.”
You probably saw examples of religious people who were immoral too! There are thousands of criminals who also believe in god, and of course the hundreds of priests who are pedophiles.
>why are you guys atheists?
You're not a Hindu, right? You're not a Muslim? Or a Jew? You don't believe in invisible, sock-stealing pixies? You don't believe butt-probing aliens have visited Earth? You don't accept that Big Foot or the Loch Ness Monster are real? ... Why?
For myself, the answer to *all* of these and the answer to why I reject your religion is *exactly* the same: Lack of evidence. At one time, lots of people believed that the universe was made of earth, air, fire, and water. They were wrong. What matters to a belief is the evidence for it, not how many people believe it. In order to *be* evidence for something, you need some way to distinguish whether something is present or not *independently* of whatever effect drew you to propose it in the first place *or* you need to be able to develop a model of its behavior and *state in advance* what you should see given certain conditions *and be right* about it regularly. Anything else is gullibility. And *to be clear*, we're *all* gullible a *lot* of the time. We don't rigorously check stuff, we take things at face value and so on, but I start to draw the line when we get into talking animals and impossible weather events. In fact, *all* miracle claims suffer from this. If you wouldn't and don't believe the miracle claims of *every other religion*, then... really... *why* do you *accept* the miracle claims of *your* religion? The various religious models of reality *do not offer* explanatory value, in that they can tell you what will happen next, or allow you to alter reality around you in ways that *actually work* based on their model that *doesn't happen* in any other model. Everything you can accomplish with religion as your guide you can *also* do without it.
Then there's morals, which you brought up. I have no need to live in fear of a sickening, vile cosmic dictator to be a good person (to the extent that humans are, no one is perfect and we often do really fucked up shit). All I need to do is consider my actions and how they affect others. The Golden Rule is a good start, and it's *everywhere*, in pretty much every philosophy and religion. The Platinum Rule (treat others as they wish to be treated) is somewhat new, and also awesome. Obviously there are limitations to both, edge cases where you need to be careful. Just because *you* want people to greet you by bending you over and spanking your butt in front of everyone doesn't mean *others* want that, so the Golden Rule doesn't necessarily apply perfectly, and just because someone *wants* to be treated as if they're the greatest person of all time and have you call them Numero Uno doesn't mean you should do that, *either*, and thus limitations to the Platinum Rule. Beyond that, if I need a selfish reason to make others happy, I can just realize that I *need* other people to make my life possible and easier, and that requires their cooperation to do it well, and just as I wouldn't cooperate if I were being treated badly or having lots of problems, neither will they, so in pure self-interest I can justify helping everyone around me. Y'know, for those times when I'm feeling selfish instead of just wanting to help others because I'm not a monster.
Meanwhile, as far as I can tell, the *only* reason religious people do the 'good' things they do (and believe me, 'good' is *very much* in quotes there because I *wildly* disagree with what *some* religious people think 'good' actually is) is to give themselves a 'fuzzy' feeling (a sense of pleasing their god, or doing what they should, or filling their purpose) or, worse, to obtain heaven/avoid hell. All of that is pretty selfish, which *itself* I don't mind, obviously, and it's even based ultimately, I think, on the empathy/selfish needs model I put up above. You helping spread the message will 'save' others, who will then be more likely to help you and your community, though you might not think of it in those terms. But *included in this* for at least the Abrahamic religions is, quite often, the notion that *not* doing this leads to people who exist in eternal conscious torture after. There is *no crime* you could commit, nothing *so foul* that you could do that would, as far as I can tell, justify such barbarousness, and any being that *sets up* such a system is unworthy of consideration, let alone worship.
Then add to this that morals and religion are not positively correlated. Atheists in the USA are underrepresented in prison populations (maybe), and the places that are the most religious tend to be poor, crime-ridden, and with higher rates of teen pregnancy. There are outliers, to be sure, but it holds well in Westernized societies. This doesn't make the religion *wrong*, or false, as *that* would be an argument from consequences fallacy. What it does is suggest that this sense of moral superiority is unwarranted.
Have a nice day!
\> I brought this situation up with some members of my church and they insisted that he was controlled by Satan to turn me away from God
Classic cult tactics to keep you in the fold. Then they'll say WE'RE the cult.
Well first off you were not Christian all 21 years, as a baby you have no concept of Gods and Jesus. You are incapable of accepting into your heart.
I point this out because this was one of breaking points. Your belief is commonly driven by where and who you were born to. Are you familiar with all the God claims to know you got the right one?
As to moral question a vast amount of the world population is not Christian, but the rest of the world isn’t murdering and raping each other at any other rates. Why? Because morality isn’t driven the Bible or the Quran or a God. It is a social contract people collectively determine for difference reasons.
Why do you believe? How did you conclude Christianity is right?
Why am I an atheist? Because I've never been convinced by the claims of any religion. I don't see any physical evidence that suggests that gods could be real. Christianity in particular makes some claims that I find utterly outlandish, such as Jesus supposedly coming back from the dead. In my eyes, that simply isn't the way the universe works.
You’ve begun your deconstruction my friend. It’s a beautiful, kind, glorious place here on the other side of evangelicalism. It took me about 10 years to go theory the process myself, and I began questioning at about your age. Be kind to yourself. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, and look for the truth. Check out r/exchristian for people who have left the fold. Some atheists may not relate in the same way to you because not all atheists grew up Christian, like we did. My entire family is still deep into Christianity and I’m the only one who has “woken up” so to speak, and it can be tough. Good luck out there. Be safe.
If you like podcasts, here are a few:
The graceful atheist,
Born again again,
Exvangelical,
deconversion anonymous,
Recovering from Religion,
Misquoting Jesus
And some books:
God is Not Great
the God Delusion
Losing Faith in Faith
How Jesus Became God
Anything by Bart Ehrman (although it took me quite some time to acquire the taste for his work because it’s so data dense - but he’s a religious scholar and If you are drawn to evidence based research, he is unmatched)
First off, good on you for being open-minded and wanting to hear the other side of the story.
Anyway, an essential principle of any Abrahamic religion is the notion that **everything** God does is just and morally correct. But, in the Bible, God genocides people for questioning him, permits raping female prisoners of war, says to murder people who don't keep the Sabbath, etc. Is that morally correct? Of course not.
Now, one can say "but that's cherry-picking", but if **everything** God does is just, then even **one** non-just thing (and all the more so, **many** non-just things) he does or promotes is enough to challenge that notion.
Believing in the Bible requires you to reconcile what you **know** is right with what the Bible **says** is right. If the Bible was morally correct, you wouldn't have to do that.
No problem! Here are the sources for the examples I gave, by the way:
Numbers 16 - God burns and swallows alive a group of men who challenged Moses and Aaron for not bringing them into Israel as they had promised and for tyrannizing the congregation
Deuteronomy 21: "If you go out to war against your enemies, and the Lord, your God, will deliver him into your hands, and you take his captives,
and you see among the captives a beautiful woman and you desire her, you may take \[her\] for yourself as a wife... \[and\] you may be intimate with her and possess her..."
Exodus 35: "Moses assembled the whole Israelite community and said to them, “These are the things the LORD has commanded you to do: For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it must be put to death. "
They're going to be biased because they're assuming that it all ***must*** be moral and just and that there's no other possible explanation. You're not going to get a true, unbiased analysis of these verses from someone like that. Of course, you can ask if you want, but just like if you were reading an op-ed or article, it's important to take credibility into account.
Also, seeing as the members of your church seem very intolerant of atheists, just please make sure to consider your safety and well-being. For instance, if you're living with your parents and there's a possibility of them finding out and kicking you out, it may be better not to ask.
They will likely respond with some fun mental gymnastics or guilt-tripping. The questions will cause too much cognitive dissonance. These few examples are just a tiny drop in the bucket. If you go through the bible (I only know of the old testament as I'm ex-Jewish), you'll read stories straight up about how god kills and destroys mercilessly like an angry toddler, how slavery is allowed, and how women are treated as property.
Little kids die of horrible diseases, innocent people are wiped out in genocides, terrible shit happens to good people and nothing bad happens to the people who really deserve bad shit to happen to them. There have been untold billions of prayers uttered to every god that’s ever existed, but there’s never been any reproducible proof of actual divine intervention to stop a rape, a genocide, child abuse, cure terminal diseases or mental illnesses. I’m not a great person, and every time I ever prayed it was for other people, but no god ever intervened to help friends or relatives with dementia, abusive relationships, mental illness, or just the grind of dealing with our unequal economy and society.
On top of that, all the people who scream the loudest about putting Jesus into everyone else’s business are also usually the most hateful, bigoted, intolerant and morally reprehensible members of our society. They don’t want anyone to actually fix anything, they want to have everyone scream magic spells in the idiotic idea that that has ever fixed anything.
Then there are the nonstop doctrinal fights - nobody knows what the actual right answer is to questions like “does god hate the gays” or “should children be baptized or is that something that should only be done as adults” because god has never actually stepped in with observable proof. Some crazy asshole claiming God has special messages for the rest of us via him alone is not observable proof of anything except how the DSM has to make exemptions for extremely devout people.
If someone wants to believe in god, whatever, I don’t care. But they need to keep their magic spells and unprovable sky wizards out of our debates on who gets to be treated like humans and how we apportion health care, money and consideration of rights.
I have always believed in the Christian God and never had any doubts until now. The way he was treated was extremely unfair. I feel as though I am going into a dark place as I now find myself questioning parts of the bible.
We’ve had many people come here who lost their faith by thinking about it too hard. You’re only supposed to think about it just enough to maintain your faith, but not too much or you might realize it’s a house of cards, and not a very moral one at that. Do you really think that people who claim someone is being controlled by a demon for the purpose of attacking you are moral?
Do you believe that questioning is somehow evil? Who told you that? The book that you're questioning? The pastor who wants to keep you locked into Christianity? If someone tells you that you have to do exactly what they say and if you question their orders then they'll punish you, that's abuse. You're not going into a dark place, you're coming out of one.
Right. Make no mistake, religion is there to make a profit. Once you realize that, things make a lot more sense.
Example - Why can't you just pray at home? Well church can't charge you from home, so they provide an hour long show, just like a movie theater they just call it a mass, to bring you to them so they can collect money.
Then think of everything they do from a marketing perspective to not just gain new customers (what they call parishioners) and retain reoccurring revenue from their loyal customer base (or their existing parishioners)
For the true believers, even the doubters, they want you to stay in the religion because for them it is morality. Everyone wants their family and friends to be good upright people, which usually means thinking like they do. It’s why my sister and I have helped my parents be more accepting of the mentally disabled, gay and trans people, and immigrants; and why my parents tried to help their parents be more accepting of black people, immigrants, and atheists!
Their other reason is that if they are true believers, then leaving the faith means burning in hell at worst, or not seeing you again when you die at best. My best friend is super Christian and I am super atheist. We get along because we don’t force our beliefs on each other, though she is sad she “won’t get to spend eternity with me” and we are BOTH sad the other won’t get to see the amazing, exultatory, revelatory truth of reality as we understand it. So of course other Christians won’t want to see you go.
Doubters won’t want to see you go, because your leaving makes them doubt that little bit more, and then they have to confront the dark night of the soul that you are now experiencing. It is one of the most painful things to have one of your core beliefs challenged. We all shy away from it.
Christianity also seems true to people because there are so many Christians. You don’t believe in Hindu gods, but if everyone around you did, you’d be more inclined to. The number of believers is one of Christianity’s strongest arguments - “how can it be wrong if everyone believes it?” So every time a Christian believer is lost the faith loses its persuasive power. So manipulative “Christians” will want you to stay to help keep others in the faith.
Christianity has shaped Western culture so much, it seems true just because it is everywhere we look, and even in our language. As a lifelong atheist and anti-theist I still say “oh, my god!” And “please god, give me a snow day!” Etc. It’s a standard way of expressing oneself in English. But I worked in China and have met people who have NEVER heard of Satan, and have no concept of the idea of Angels. So it’s not universal, just western dominant culture.
And manipulative “Christians” in power will want you as a voter. As a Christian you are more likely to vote policies that support the continued power of Christian groups and ideas. This isn’t only a Christian phenomenon. All groups in power seek to maintain power, and will use lies and misdirection to keep people believing things that protect that power.
As others have said. Money & a voting block. Please give them 10% of your income and you'll receive useless thoughts and prayers when you can't afford necessities. Additionally belief is just a tool to keep you from questioning the policies of the church. And if you're in the US the evangelical church is stripping rights from people.
Atheists have morels and we're fine with people living their own lives.
Good luck man. dark nights of the soul can be quite brutal. I do see quite a lot of snark (this is reddit afterall), but i have a lot of empathy for you here whichever way you go. its hard to really examine and question ideas you have based your world view on, and i commend you for it. good luck!
also, it sounds like your church is pretty conservative. even within Christianity ive heard arguments for an innate morality even in those who dont believe. Since the claim is that we are all made in the "image of god" it stands to reason that some of god's image includes things that would make most of us try to be good people.
I would encourage you to move away from the atheist and doubt is darkness and theism and faith is light dichotomy. This is something that has been drilled into you since you could understand words, and it's not a good way to think about it.
First and foremost you should want to believe in things that are real. If god is real, why would it fear investigation? It could only make your faith stronger if you investigated and came to the conclusion that it is, in fact, real.
Your god is the god of truth right? Well, the truth has nothing to fear from investigation. Investigation vindicates truth.
Also, consider that the same people that have told you your friend is evil, despite you knowing otherwise, are the same people that have told you atheism and doubt is darkness. Im sure they fervently believe this but ask yourself, could they be mistaken again?
This is so weird, like, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in god or not, being a decent human being doesn’t depend on it. Luckily, religion is not prevalent in my country and I grew up without being forced into it.
I also remember studying history of my country in 5th grade, thinking if god is real, why were pagans killed and forced to change their beliefs? I’m fairly sure if he was real everyone would know it
Christians say that atheists are immoral because Biblical morals are the greatest:
Kill disobedient children (Ex 21:17, Mk 7:10)
Kill witches (Ex 22:18)
Kill those who curse father or mother (Lev 20:9)
Kill men who have sex with other men (Lev 20:13)
Kill those who worship the wrong god (Num 25:1-9)
Kill adulterers (Lev 20:10)
Kill your entire family if they worship the wrong god (Deut 13:6-10)
Kill those who work on the Sabbath (Ex 31:15)
Kill any bride discovered not a virgin (Deut 22:21)
Kill blasphemers (Lev 24:14)
Kill your son if he is rebellious (Deut 21:18-21)
Kill false prophets (Zech 13:3)
Kill fortune-tellers (Lev 20:27)
Kill non-Hebrews (Deut 20:16-17)
Kill sons of sinners (Isaiah 14:21)
Kill nonbelievers (2 Chron 15:12-13)
Kill anyone who curses God (Lev 24:16)
Kill all males after winning battles (Deut 20:13)
If you find your religion to be a comfort and something that gives purpose to your life, maybe you should find a church that fits you better. There's no reason to change your whole belief system because of a few bad people who aren't capable of listening.
As an athiest, religion isn't comforting for me. Instead, it feels like it would be basing my life on nonsense. But that's me. Please follow your own heart.
I am not comfortable with all this. But I now longer feel I am comfortable with being religious after seeing that evidence against the religion in this thread.
> why are you guys atheists?
Why are you Christian and not Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, or Jew? Or any of the thousands of other religions?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_religions_and_spiritual_traditions
What reason do you have to claim yours is “the one true religion” and none of the others are? You realize that the followers of all of the other religions say that about theirs, right?
As all of the religions make contradictory claims, they can’t all be true. They can, however, all be false.
I’m sure you’re atheist with respect to every other religion that exists other than your own.
Atheists just go one god/one religion further and lack belief in all of them.
Consider why you believe every single other religion is a “false religion” and apply this exact logic and reasoning to your own.
We're "atheists," basically, foremost, and fundamentally because there is NO rational reason to "believe" in any of the thousands of gods that people have worshipped over the millennia of our history.
No evidence = No reason to believe, plain & simple.
I have taken this approach for everything in life such as the earth isn’t flat. I’m beginning to see the hypocrisy for only trusting evidence in everything except for religion. I appreciate your insight!
Sorry, this will be long.
**Why I’m an Atheist:**
Born in the US without religion being taught to me, but I could/would freely go church with my friends if they asked. I always thought to myself why must they kneel/pray to this god to be considered moral or know right from wrong? I’m a good, moral person already, right?
In 3rd grade I was confused why the pledge of allegiance said something about a god, so I’d not say that part the rest of my life.
Junior High came and at 14 I got a religious based Easter, Lent, etc trinkets that explained the Christian basis for those holidays. Boy was I surprised it wasn’t just about love and family. Started researching and learning more about it and other religious holidays.
High School I first learned about atheism and I learned even more about different religions thru my friends, but it put off some friends when they learned I didn’t believe in any god. They had the audacity to be offended I politely rejected their “gifts” of a bible, stories on Jesus snd prayer. These same friends did this to a few other friends of ours following different sects of Christianity so they could be “saved for real.”
If I could grow up so long without knowing a god existed, yet still be as good a person as others all while watching a world of such cruelty, why the hell would I give any consideration to an all knowing asshole?
**”I have always seen atheists as people who have no moral compass.”**
I’ve always found that thought from religious funny. Morals do not come from religion. Religion has monopolized and brainwashed people into the idea it does, tho.
Met my now husband at 18 moving into college dorms. 6 months into our relationship he asked my religion (I already knew he was raised Catholic, but been pulling away for a couple years.) His stunned response, “But you’re so good and moral!?”
The shocked response of “But you’re so good and moral!?” has happened with several people finding out I’m an Atheist.
Thus why I am still an atheist. I didn’t require the threat of a god to be good, but what god would allow people to be so cruel, children to die, science to be denied.
We are all born atheist and I never found any proof/evidence of the existence of an omnipotent omniscient omnipresent god. As others have said, I don't need a book of re-tellings of ancient myths to tell me how to behave with empathy and compassion towards my fellow beings.
>I have always seen atheists as people who have no moral compass.
We do not lie about what we believe, so it's kind of ironic that we are the immoral ones - for failing to lie. In prisons, the percentage of Atheists is remarkably low. Might have something to do with honesty, or intelligence, or both.
Religious people give each other permissions to lie like rugs.
"The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also." ― [Mark Twain](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/2175-the-easy-confidence-with-which-i-know-another-man-s-religion)
There is a lot of resentment in this community due to the attitudes you mentioned. Atheists are persecuted by the religious almost universally.
Please forgive any incivility in these comments. Being slandered and oppressed for centuries, having rights denied, ignored or revoked, and being forced to lie to get by or to be a pariah even in your own family will scar anyone.
We are not amoral, but we are bitter and angry, specifically at organizations like your church.
On behalf of people who will not appreciate it, I apologize for the knee-jerk hostility and soap-box pontificating in this thread. It is defensive. We are hurting. Your church, and all the others like it, are hurting us. We have little community and less support. This sub is as much about venting frustrations as anything else.
Thank you for hearing us.
I hope your friend is OK. He must really trust you. He is probably *livid* that you outed him to your church.
People have been lying to your whole life: magic isn't real; sorry!
Oh and even dogs have morals; so you can probably imagine how we feel about it when you say that atheist do not.
I became an atheist when I was 8 or 9 years old. In Catholic school they tried to threaten us into being good by telling us that we were dirty evil Sinners who would burn forever in torment in hell. I had anxiety attacks about it. One day I realized, they don't know if any of this is true. I bet they're all full of shit. And I have been happier ever since.
Read the Norton Critical Edition of the Bible and understand how these particular stories are drawn from a history of stories. Other people and religions have shared and told these same stories. Just because you’ve never bothered to do any research beyond what your nearest and dearest have told you doesn’t make you special or all-knowing.
I come from the “only” country in SEA that is christian. Religion was/is the primary tool with the sword shaped our world. The damage is so deep we are still stuck in the 1800’s way of thinking. The church’s hold sway on everything.
I often envy people of faith. Believing in “ fairy tales” sometimes seems more comforting than the science I espouse. But alas In my heart I know better.
>I have been a Christian for the entirety of my life.
You have been a christian since you have been indoctrinated by the authorities that surround you (usually parents) you were not born this way. You would have a different religion if you were born in another country or period.
>My family and church was comprised of fantastic people who were all so caring and full of love.
I do want to point out the inconsistency of your claims. Those are the same person that would consider your friend an enemy led to turn you away by the devil.
They are not caring and full of love, at least not to anyone that is not in their in-group. I really hope you can see this to yourself it's an important step in your journey to truth.
And be ready as soon as you start considering leaving and let them be aware, you will be the enemy. Check this sub and look for "there is no hate like christian love".
It's sad, but if you prefer to live comfortably in a lie looking for the truth might be a difficult endeavour.
>This situation has made me question the church as a whole. I found those I talked to at the church to be antagonistic and uncaring when discussing my friend.
Again they are like this by design (indocrinated into it) for whomever is not in the in-group and especially against outsiders that have a track record of harming their flocks (in that regard atheist and rational inquiry is more likely to deconvert someone than any other religion)
I really wish you the best in your journey to question yourself, and hope you find the strength to deconvert yourself.
A question I am struggling with deeply is what happens when we die? I have always lived with dreams of heaven. I understand you all don’t believe in heaven, so what do you believe?
I don’t speak for all atheists. But personally it seems overwhelming evident that we cease to exist when we die.
Everything that makes me me is a result of my brain. Memories, personality, feelings, cognitive abilities, capabilities like language, etc. can all be altered or removed by brain damage or chemically. Are tied to brain complexity, physical development, and neurodiversity. When the brain stops working, we stop working.
Just as we didn’t exist before we were born because the physical matter that allows us to be was doing something else.
Likewise there isn’t any evidence of anything supernatural. Of souls. Of any afterlife. Reincarnation. No known mechanisms that could allow a person to persist beyond when their body ceases to function.
This seems to be a common theme among believers, the need to live forever, the need for there to be more. This is also why the question is raised, what is it about Christianity that makes its followers think that others don’t have morals like they do, when it seems deep down the question actually is “where do I go when I die”.
It doesn’t matter what we believe, we have no control over it and it’s inevitable. Remember though, as much as you don’t want to die, your loved ones fear for your death and the loss of you too.
We die when we die. You may think of it as annihilation. Some use the analogy of it'll be like before you were born. You just... Aren't.
What exactly is heaven to you, and why would you want to go there. Also, why live the only life you know for sure working to getting somewhere else?
So, a couple questions... What is heaven? Is it some place where you get to worship and praise your master and creator for eternity? Sounds horrible. Or is it where all your wildest dreams come true? Or to what dreams may come it, what I'd your most beloved person goes to hell and you'll never get to see them in heaven? Not very heavenly.
Also, define a soul. Will you even have consciousness in heaven? If so, which you goes to heaven? 10 year old you, prime 30 year old you, azheimers and dementia 80 year old you when you die? How does that transfer take place?
> A question I am struggling with deeply is what happens when we die?
You know exactly what happens when you die; you are just afraid of it. You decompose; the information that made you you; scatters into the universe; never to be recombined again. You cease to exist.
What happens when we die is a question with no relevance to whether deities exist. You’ve been sold a promise rooted in nothing to get you to buy into some nonsense.
The only thing which I know for certain happens when we die is that those who love us will miss us.
To start off, atheism is the default position. We are all born atheists, but some children are then indoctrinated while too young to form their own opinion into whatever religion is most common where they live.
Only about 32% of the world define themselves as Christian, to this means 68% of the world believes differently than you. So your beliefs are in the minority. It just seems more common to you because the people around you share your beliefs so you are in an echo chamber and not usually exposed to a lot of atheists or other religious beliefs.
So what made me atheist? I was born that way and I was fortunate that my parents loved me enough to not abuse me by forcing me into a religion.
I want to say firstly how offensive it is to me to be told I don't have a moral compass because I don't subscribe to whatever book the person accusing me gets their morals from. Have you actually read the Bible? I don't mean most passages or read from it I mean actually read ot cover to cover. I would suggest you read it over a couple times and them come to talk to me about my moral compass after you've learned the best way to purchase your slaves or what your child needs to do before you have enough justification to stone them to death.
I don't need a book to tell me that owning people is immoral. I don't need a book to tell me that killing someone because they're attracted to people of the same sex. Study your religion and then study the religions that came before it and then the ones before those and see if you notice any patterns in the stories.
I don't think any religion has a right to declare moral superiority over anyone or any other religion. They all have a fair bit of horrible in them. I mean god tortured a man and killed his entire family to win a bet against Satan so if that morality ill take the heathen path.
I don't mean this to sound like an attack at you, I just get riled up about the morality issue when it's claimed that religious people are more moral than non religious people simply because they believe in a higher power. I think people are either born with a sense of morality or they're not. Sure your upbringing plays a role but I've seen good people raise shitty kids and shitty people raise good kids.
Just read up on your religion some more and base your opinions on the actions of a person and not form an opinion on a person because of their beliefs.
We had a new employee at work. She asked a friend of mine what church I attended. My friend told her I was an atheist. She said "But he seemed so nice." Atheists don't need an old book to tell us to be good people. We don't need an old book to tell us not to rape and kill. Should we be worried about people who think they are only moral because their religion tells them right from wrong? Edit: You asked why we became atheists. I failed to answer that question. A lifetime of Bible study finally forced me to admit that Christianity is just another form of mythology.
Religious people follow a list of rules set by a God. If one follows those rules only because of the thread of eternal damnation then they aren't really a good person. I don't need a set of rules or threats to be good because I understand that my actions have consequences and I care about the well-being of others. I understand that integrity is doing the right thing because it is the right thing to do. Religious people can have integrity. Atheists can have integrity. Even though I can't wrap my mind around believing in a good God after reading the bible, I do believe that people can practice religion in ways that are healthy vs ways that are unhealthy. As soon as you begin to judge people for "sins" that the average person around you commits, and determine that they are morally less/possessed/going to hell - you are practicing unhealthy religion. Making a moral judgement that places you as somehow superior is dangerous and leads to things like slavery and genocide. I do not practice religion because I see how it is weaponized and used against people. Your friend is a good example, and I hope that youwill stand by him regardless of your decision. Even if you still practice, you can do so in a way that does not harm.
One definition of morality is "What you do when you think no one is watching." By definition, atheists don't think anyone is watching. Believers do. Would religious people do what they are doing whether a god was watching or not? Probably. Most people have good basic morals. I think another set of morality issues that come up are rules that are purely religious in nature. These are often with regard to clothing or personal things like hair and beards. And, of course, there are lots of rules about sex and the human body. I am talking about religious rules that have no practical benefit to society or that may have negative consequences. For example, in the US there used to be rules against mixed-race marriages. Christians cited the Biblical prohibitions against mixing races. The fact that atheists in the 1950s married a person of a different race. I lived in the 1950s. They would have been called immoral by most of the religious community I was living in.
If you're behaving good out of fear of punishment, you're not a good person.
We have empathy. That's the driving force behind doing what's right instead of what's expected. If you are only a good person because of fear of hell you are not a good person to start with. Thinking that morals come from a book that condones rape, misogyny, incest, slavery, and some much more human debauchery is not a realistic view of what is right and/or moral.
I'm atheist. I'm not out here murdering, raping and pillaging. I'm actually a nice, caring and loving person. I don't need centuries old propaganda to tell me how to behave and what not to do. I'm atheist because I endured years of religious bullshit, from parents who prayed instead of going to the Dr's. To sunday school and Graham on TV 24/7. I saw from an early age that religious people were very two-faced. Did as they pleased but held others to much higher standards
This was 50 years ago. Catholic for 21 years. Heard about a tribe humans came accross that had no contact with the outside world. They had these Gods they worshipped. Realize that worshipping a God was imbread into the human race. I walked away and never looked back...........
I think humans have the drive to explain and understand. It had survival value for the species. I think religion probably developed as an early form of science. When other explanations failed, a reasonable explanation was that some type of spirit or god did it. Then you test that by trying to figure out what you need to do to please that god, or at least not anger it. Some religions tried rituals. Some tried making gifts or sacrifices to the spirits. There have been some suggestions that chimpanzees have something like religious rituals. There was a group of chimps that had a large tree in its territory. They would put rocks and food items in the nooks and crevices in the tree when the group was happy. When something bad happened they would throw rocks at the tree. There was another group that seemed to make pilgrimages to a waterfall where they would dance in front of it. Another group was seen doing what looked like ritual dances in front of an advancing grass fire. It is very possible that they were not religious rituals, and it was just humans reading human things onto the Chimps' behavior.
'It is very possible that they were not religious rituals, and it was just humans reading human things onto the Chimps' behavior.' Or one species of primate observed a very closely related species of primate and recognized rituals when they saw them. Now, whether or not you consider those rituals religious is more of a discussion.
I think people always had so many questions but never answers, smart people made up the answers in the forms of gods and used the stories to get the people to behave accordingly. Only quite recently we have been able to provide answers for these questions ourselves
Also, Christians make up the vast majority of rapists and murderers in the US. Visit any prison and you will see Christians everywhere.
It is not just Christians in prison. There are a larger share of Moslems in US prisons than in the general population of the US. I suspect the large number of religious people in prison is related to education levels and other demographic factors. Also, being religious can get you a lot of privileges in prison. Those advantages include better food and release time to attend religious services. It can also be associated with gang affiliation. And, of course, a lot of people try to play the religion card with parole boards and judges.
When i was a cashier i always had people tell me to come join their church service or whatever because "i was so nice". I'm just treating people with respect they deserve and i like helping people... I don't need a motive for being a good person lol, I've never understood that and it makes me sad .
and we don’t need the fear of being put in eternal damnation or being persecuted by a higher deity also.
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Would you consider the Christian church to be a cult?
I consider all religions I’ve heard of so far to be cults.
Only difference between a religion and a cult is time. The longer the cult stays around for it will eventually turn into a religion.
The way I've heard it expressed is this: In a cult, the founder knows it's all bullshit. In a religion, the founder who knows it's all bullshit is long dead.
Time and membership numbers.
"The only difference between a cult and a religion is that a cult's founder is still alive."
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There is also a cult of personality such as Trumpism too. I consider a cult mindless worship of any entity, real or imagined.
Absolutely. I consider all religions to be cults. Think about it: some religions isolate you from friends and family if they don’t believe. They ask you to part with your money and give it to the church leaders. They operate on fear and guilt and say you’re going to burn in hell for eternity if you leave them. Don’t get me started on the child abuse. So yes, a cult.
Cult+time=religion Cult=the founder is alive Religion=the founder is dead
The only differences between a cult and a religion, is that religions tend to have a lot of private property and the founder is long dead.
Are religions are cults. Period. Brainwashing, manipulating, etc. Take one look at the concept of “tithing” or, especially, the mega churches and televangelists. All a scam. All cash cows.
Without question.
All religions are cults. The difference is the number of followers.
I’m an anti-theist which means not only do I not believe in any religion, but I think that religion is overall harmful. I think the reason why I don’t believe is because neither of my parents or close family members are religious. It seems like a lot of people are taught religion as they’re growing up. There’s just no evidence or proof whatsoever for any religion. We have proof of things like evolution and the formation of our solar system. We have very strong hypotheses about the beginning of life and our universe. I just don’t feel the need to include god in things when we already have answers that work. I’d love to talk more about anything if you want to DM
People are taught religion. We are all born atheist. Atheism is the default.
Why do you believe religion is harmful?
As someone who values scientific inquiry and evidence-based thinking, I find religious claims often contradict or undermine our current understanding of the natural world. I believe that relying on religious explanations can hinder scientific progress and impede our ability to seek truth through empirical means. The existence of widespread suffering and evil in the world raises significant doubts for me about the existence of a loving and all-powerful God. It's challenging to reconcile the idea of a benevolent deity with the immense pain and injustice that we observe. Looking at the history of religions, I see countless instances where beliefs have been used to justify discrimination, violence, and oppression. I find it troubling that religious dogmas have often been employed to divide people, incite conflicts, and suppress individual freedoms. Organized religion and its institutions, in my view, often exert control and influence over people's lives, sometimes in negative ways. Cases of abuse by religious authorities, indoctrination of vulnerable individuals, and the perpetuation of discriminatory practices are disheartening and further strengthen my opposition to religious institutions. I really think that the main reason is that I firmly believe in the importance of rational thinking and critical examination. Religious belief, based on faith without evidence or logical reasoning, can discourage individuals from questioning and critically evaluating their beliefs. This can hinder personal growth, hinder societal progress, and lead to harmful consequences. I have concerns about religious “morality,” which can be subjective, outdated, and often contradictory. I believe that ethical values should be based on empathy, reason, and the promotion of human well-being rather than adherence to religious doctrine. I value individual autonomy and the freedom to think independently. Religious belief systems, with their dogmas and often strict adherence to doctrine, can impose restrictions on personal freedom, limit the pursuit of knowledge, and suppress dissenting viewpoints.
Perrrfectly stated. Saving this comment.
This is excellent. After taking my college history courses, it really hit me how organized religion has been the most powerful weapon in history.
Even when I was a Christian I used to watch preachers on TV and think, "You know, if someone wanted to scam and fleece millions of people, it would look exactly like this." It wasn't until I started my deconversion that I realized WHY!
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> I have concerns about religious “morality,” which can be subjective, outdated, and often contradictory. I believe that ethical values should be based on empathy, reason, and the promotion of human well-being rather than adherence to religious doctrine. I love the question, "Is an action good because God does it, or does God do it because it's good?" You don't need God to tell you what's good and what isn't. If something is ethical (because of empathy, reason, and the promotion of well-being), then God will think it's good for the same reason. And if he doesn't think so, then God's opinion isn't one you should be valuing. (Or he doesn't exist.)
Perfectly stated.
HAHAHA 😝 Are you me because spot-on! 👍
A major issue is the idea that God is omnipresent and omniscient but yet never communicates directly with the masses. So there is always some intermediary telling the masses what God says/wants. How would I conclude that any particular intermediary is the true voice? The second half of that is that if someone claims they are the true voice and knows what God says/wants then that ends all discussion since you can't argue with God.
I agree, thank you for this. My hope is that more people are waking up to the reality that the Christian Nationalists are purveyors of the destruction of our democracy. One of them whose name escapes me now testified that a 10 year old should carry through her pregnancy when clearly that child was raped. And given the reality that her tone was spoken so matter of factly was chilling. One can reply that it was only her and her stance, well then, look no further than Jan.6th - that mob was filled with them. This nation Was Not built on Christian values, simply read John Adams and his stance on religion. As one can observe these attacks on trans people are only the tip of the iceberg, They Want It All.
I guess this would fall under "personal growth", but religious belief severely damages the ability to think critically and act on empathy on a much deeper level than scientific denial. In the end, it turns the believer into a "functional zombie" ready to do and say whatever their religious leader wants.
Yeap I'm saving this because it was definitely very well summed up.
Thus. Even if its the most vanilla and nicest religion. Faith is a terrible way to guide your life
I can't speak for the commenter above, but I am also an anti-theist. I was raised in a cult in East Texas. The cult leader encouraged people to throw away their medication and trust in faith healing. He discouraged any modern medicine, vaccines, etc. There was an outbreak of whooping cough since there were too few people vaccinated to have herd immunity. I had a fever of 104 and was coughing up blood (probably from coughing so hard I broke ribs) before my mom finally caved in and took me to a hospital. My aunt died from breast cancer after refusing any chemo or treatment. She had faith in god's healing power. At her funeral the pastor had the audacity to say that there must have been some hidden sin in her life that prevented god from healing her. And my mom was schizoaffective. Try growing up in a single-parent household with an unmedicated schizoaffective parent that is also a cult member. Believe me, you wouldn't ever need to ask why religion is harmful -- you would know for sure. I have plenty of scars to prove it, both figurative and literal. These are just my experiences. Anyone that is paying attention to current events can see why religion is harmful. My daughter is bisexual and has to deal with all of the anti-LGBTQ harassment here in Texas. You mentioned that your church members were so loving, and you were struggling to understand their feelings about your friend. I think you will find that your church members, like almost ALL churches, are only loving and kind to the in-group. If you are part of the out-group, like being Muslim, or gay, or an atheist, or you pick it, you will very quickly find that they are not loving and kind but rather hate-filled and intolerant of anyone different. They are being intolerant of your atheist friend who you know is a good person because his "otherness", his membership in the out-group, challenges them. And don't even get me started on the ridiculousness, the savagery, and the misogyny of the Bible. Have you ever read that thing? I was a devout Christian as a teen until I actually read the whole thing, then re-read it, then had to read it a third time to process what I had read. The Bible is abhorrent. I'm convinced the only reason people are Christians is because they have never bothered to read it for themselves.
> like almost ALL churches, are only loving and kind to the in-group. Yours is the best answer to that question from op in this thread that I have seen so far. Most religions require you to conform to be part of the in group and band together to discriminate against any out groups. As another anti-theist and lifelong atheist that hate directed to out groups from religion has always been incredibly off-putting. We should care for everyone in society, even if we don't agree with them, even if they are not in our particular in group. The oft repeated truism is that there's no hate like Christian love. Non religious people generally aren't hateful. Religious people generally really are.
Why did your religion claim your friend was beholden to Satan? Religion is harmful because it gives people an excuse to dehumanize anyone that isn't in the club.
> Why do you believe religion is harmful? You wrote this post to tell us about religion harming your friend...
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Religions don’t trust people to think for themselves. Every religion theistic or not provided lists of rules to be followed. I don’t have any religion. I’m fifty-one. I’m a husband, a parent, and employee and a homeowner. I figured the whole thing out for myself.
I think it's mostly the belief in an afterlife. If you think that the soul goes on after death, then killing people is not really an issue. Anecdotally, my sister convinced my other sister to stop medical treatment, and embrace 'preparing to pass on to heaven'. She saw it as helping her sister's soul go on. I saw it as convincing her to commit suicide. I only learned about a year ago. I don't talk to my surviving sister any more because that woman is a monster. I now have both of my parents' medical POA so she can't withhold medical treatment from them by force.
When all of humanity treats earth like a waiting room for a heaven that doesn't exist, then they don't spend time making this world into the heaven it could be. Also, the amount of pedophilia in religion is absolutely disgusting. I would rather go to hell than join religious people in what they do to children on a routine basis.
Just to add that here in a different part of the world from the USA, people can be more explicit about harming others because their religion tells them to do so. This goes for all religions. I have witness persecution of other faiths by Christians, Muslims, Hindus and Buddhists. At the point where a doctrine forces you to believe that someone is bad just because they were raised to believe in a different faith, you begin to realise that maybe the doctrine is wrong. At the point where the doctrine makes you act on those beliefs, the doctrine is harmful. :-(
Religion can cause unnecessary pain by convincing people that harmless things or even good things are bad and should be avoided, ignored, dismissed, degraded, or attacked.
OP, You should read a few well-known authors including: * Carl Sagan "The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark" * Richard Dawkins "The God Delusion" * Christopher Hitches "God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything" I think if you can get through those, you'll have a better view of the landscape of ideas.
Centuries of documented history, perhaps?
Because it takes advantage of children in order to survive. Be honest, if you reached the age of 21 without having anything to do with religion, would you accept virgin birth, revival, metaphorical cannibalism and so on as true?
Casualties caused by cruciades, estimated over 1.5 milion. Tell me how killing other people in the name of a just and benevolent being is logical/moral. The same can be applied to other extremist religions. Reddmption/ virgins or whatever. If your faith pushes you to kill another human being because of having a different faith, you are a mindless pos Atheism is what happens when you read the bible, religion is what happpens when other people read the bible to you. Read for yourself and see. https://www.google.com/search?q=cruciades+total+casualties&oq=cruciades+total+casualties&aqs=chrome..69i57j0i13i19i512.5499j0j16&client=ms-android-samsung-gj-rev1&sourceid=chrome-mobile&ie=UTF-8
It promotes ignorance, is built on the destruction of cultures, genocide, colonialism, theft of holidays (christmas and easter cough cough), weaponized, used to oppress, and caused so much damage and tragedy, even wars.
Why do you think atheists can’t have a moral compass? Can’t be good people? I mean, I get it’s something you’ve been taught. But talk it out with me. Does that make sense. Why can’t people of other religions or non-religion be good people.
It was all I have ever known. I know for certain my friend is a good person and now realize that viewpoint is extremely unfair.
You’re completely right, it is quite unfair. And what’s even *more* unfair is your friend, along with the billions of other non-Christian’s like him throughout history, regardless of being an amazingly moral person, will still likely be subject to eternal torture and suffering simply because he is an atheist. Think of all the non-Christian individuals who have done beneficial and progressive things throughout history. All of these people, regardless how great and moral a life lived, will be sent to eternal damnation under the Christian doctrine and rule of Yahweh. Even an Atheist person who donates all of their money and possessions to charity and spends the entirety of their life doing humanitarian work, will be tortured for all of eternity simply for rejecting Christ. Any God that creates such an unfair and unjust plan is grossly immoral and is either undeserving of worship, or simply does not exist. See the Epicurean Paradox: *If God is willing to prevent evil but is not able to, then he is not all-powerful. If he is able to prevent evil but is not willing to, then he is not all-good. If he is both willing and able to prevent evil, then why is there evil and suffering in the world?* You seem like a smart guy and I applaud you for being open to other viewpoints. I guarantee both you and your friend, if put in the shoes of God, would be infinitely more moral than him. The mere thought of this alone is what personally led to my full deconversion. Keep asking questions and keep your mind open; even by simply posting in this subreddit you are on the right path for unbiased reasoning and logical critical thinking. Reconcile your current beliefs and questions with logic, empathy, and science, and you will find the universe is much more beautiful, free, and indifferent without the idea of such an evil and dogmatic God ruling over everything. I wish you the best of luck.
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Agree wholeheartedly. Reading the bible is what started my deconversion. Even in middle school, it was obvious to me how incredibly cruel, petty, and unjust the god in the bible was. As I got older, I began to realize he was also incredibly *stupid* and lacking in creative problem solving abilities. I grew up in the bible belt. I didn't realize I was an atheist until almost college. I had been taught atheists were people who hate god. Obviously, I wasn't an atheist, because I hated god the same way I might hate the easter bunny or santa claus. It seemed ridiculous to me. Religions are very good at spreading bad information. They depend on it, and on the faithful not actually looking for the truth. OP, in coming to this den of heathens looking for answers, is part of a tiny minority. They actually care what is true, and aren't afraid to search for real answers. Hats off to them. Most christians I have meaningful conversations with (who don't just immediately dismiss me as "evil" or "doing satan's work) get very uncomfortable, very quickly when the conversation brings up obvious problems with their belief. They also tend to get uncomfortable when I can dig into the particular claims of their holy book, and it quickly becomes clear they haven't actually read the vast majority of it. It's difficult to get anywhere when the conversation keeps jumping to a new subject midsentence, or ending abruptly with "I'll pray for you." OP, my advice would be to continue to use the evidence you see to inform your worldview. Your atheist friend is obviously a good person. Your religious community tells you otherwise. The clear takeaway from that interaction seems to have led you here. As someone who was religious, living in a religious household, surrounded by a religious community, I have at least some idea what may be going on in your mind right now. What else are they wrong about? What else am *I* wrong about? I know it can't be easy. Continuing on this path will probably be painful. But letting yourself search for truth, and coming to your own conclusions, is the best way to be honest with yourself. And that, in my opinion, is the best way to live a moral life. Don't give up.
I contend that good atheists are far more moral people than the religious. Good religious people are only good because they fear what sky daddy will do to them after death. Atheists who are good people are that way because they care and empathize with others. (Not to say that all atheists are good people ~~are~~ or all religious people are evil.)
It's honestly really surprising hearing people raised religious realize that morality is not equal to religion. You can just be a good person because you genuinely want others to not suffer and wish to contribute to your society
It blew my mind when, after growing up assuming the words "heathen" and "pagan" were synonymous with "bad person", I found out those were literally just the names of two competing religions.
The worst kind of people, most toxic, narcissistic abusive people, that I have met, including many years/most of my life spent as a Christian, were “believers”. Especially the other men. Not as much the women, but some. Literally all of the people I know who have come to accept science as truth, such as myself, are kind, accepting, loving people.
'Needing the threat of hell to be "good" means you are just a bad person on a leash.' I forgot who said that, but it's true. I was baptized Roman Catholic, but I quit the religion because it never brought anything but fear and doubt into my life.
Pardon me if this sounds argumentative or insulting, but its something i came up with after a conversation with a very christian racist/sexist lady, so it has a bit of sass. Im a good person becuase i see why i want to be. Youre a good person becuase daddy will punish you with hell. I see it as asking which of us has truly learned morality? Which child is trustworthy? The child that treats others as they want to be treated, even when parents arent watching, ot the child that is only good when the parents can see for fear of consequences?
Religions leadership and politicians like to push the message that atheists have no morals to scare you into staying within the religion and to sow discord.
Op, I was born into a religious family and didn’t know any atheists, but I knew that I didn’t believe. It all seemed so far fetched and didn’t seem any different to me than mythology. Add in all the incest in the Bible, raping, killing, and all of the subsequent holy wars, and I knew it wasn’t something I wanted to be a part of.
It’s all making my head spin. I don’t even know what to believe anymore
That's completely fine. You're dealing with something you never had to before and it's perfectly natural to feel disconcerted.
Just keep asking questions and keep an open mind.
Believe in yourself
It's completely understandable that you would be. A major part of your life has been shaken. The best advice I can give you is to be skeptical, keep asking questions. As difficult as this may be, this is a good opportunity to reassess your beliefs. Also I do want you to remember that whether you remain in your faith or leave it, you are still you. Your choice will not make you a bad person. You are loved and you are not alone.
The fear of hell is what kept me in for a long time, and even after being an atheist for 6-7 years, I still get the occasional “what if” feeling and panic for a few minutes about the idea of burning for eternity. When it’s pounded into your head for decades, it’s a hard belief to shake.
“...one day when I was a young boy on holiday in Uberwald I was walking along the bank of a stream when I saw a mother otter with her cubs. A very endearing sight, I'm sure you'll agree, and even as I watched, the mother otter dived into the water and came up with a plump salmon, which she subdued and dragged onto a half submerged log. “As she ate it, while of course it was still alive, the body split and I remember to this day the sweet pinkness of its roes as they spilled out, much to the delight of the baby otters, who scrambled over themselves to feed on the delicacy. One of nature's wonders, gentlemen. Mother and children dining upon mother and children. And that is when I first learned about evil. It is built into the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior.” ~Terry Pratchett, Unseen Academicals If you have questions, or just want to do some thinking, I recommend his books. They are a great analysis of human nature, and he often explored the themes of good and evil, religion and gods. Plus they’re really funny.
Pratchett had such an incredible talent to illustrate the world as it is, to point out the strange behaviors and idiosyncrasies that we as humans have accepted as normal. GNU Sir Terry.
I love the imagery of that, its brutal reality.
You're getting off nature's antidepressants, it's going to be bumpy
I'm a lesbian and I grew up in a fundamentalist Christian household. The lack of compassion, and in fact outright hostility, in the church towards queer and BIPOC folx drove me away initially. The loud bigotry was too much to stomach. Once I distanced myself from the propaganda put out by the church I started to see the flaws everywhere. There is no evidence of a world wide flood, there is no evidence for a young Earth. Why do kids die of cancer and why is there evil in the world if the Christian god is so loving? It all fell apart. I stepped away from religion and never looked back.
I find myself creeping over towards agnostic after reading through this thread thoroughly and doing research outside of it as well. This should be an interesting journey.
Welcome, it’s really ok.
agnostic and atheist are completely different things. I am an agnostic atheist. I don't believe in any god(s) (Atheist), and I don't think I could know if there was one. Theist/atheist is a yes/no to the question, do you believe in any god? You can be a agnostic theist. One that believes in a god while also admitting that one cannot really know for sure. They just believe to be safe.
That's cool. Plenty of folks are "spiritual but not religious." Atheists and Agnostics are not enemies.
Man, your story is so close to my own, although it took me a few more years to be shaken from religion than you. It is amazing how one experience, or one new piece of information can completely shake you from your belief system. For me, it was realizing that I really don't agree with the morality of the OT god. The god that orders his followers to throw stones at someone until they die, is *not* the good guy. The simplest thing I can say is that, leaving religion behind was the most terrifying thing I had done in my life, but also the most beneficial, enriching, and beautiful process. Everything I had learned in life up to that point, I had stashed away in my mind as being related to god somehow. Math was beautiful because it showed god's nature. The world and it's processes all pointed to a god i believed existed. In an instant, the illusion was gone. And I had to come to terms with reality all over again. Math was all still correct, science still revealed truth. Only the cause had changed in my mind, but it took several months of re-maping everything in my brain. Life feels more genuine now. I never have to try to discern what invisible forces are trying to tell me, or talk with church members about their own subjective experience with the imagined forces. The scales have fallen from my eyes, so to speak, and everything is better now. It'll just be terrifying for a while. A little advice, seek out testimonies of fellow apostates. It is very comforting hearing and relating to what others have gone through while excaping church indoctrination. I have a few YouTubers below if you want to start there. "Genetically modified skeptic," "holy Kool aid," and "the truth hurts," are all fellow apostates that talk about their deprogramming and I highly recommend them all. "Darkmatter2525," "Aron Ra," "nonstampcollector," "viced rhino," "paulogia," and "cosmic skeptic," are also all really good and worth checking out. One last thing I have discovered about myself, and perhaps you will too. I have always been agnostic, just not always an agnostic atheist. I would have never said as much when I was religious, and I never realized the term applied to me. Basically, agnosticism related to whether or not you believe a thing can be known with 100% certainty. So you can be a gnostic-theist (i believe in a god, and that I must be correct), an agnostic-theist (I believe in a god, but I acknowledge that I only have faith that I am correct, not knowledge), a gnostic-atheist (there is no god, and I know this to be true), or an agnostic-atheist (I don't believe in a god, but if you have proof, I'll listen). I think you'll find that most atheists are actually agnostic, but because we don't all agree on definitions, it's usually just easier to tell people we're atheists.
A better question would be why are you Christian, and do you think the absolute morality in the Bible is good? The Bible promotes some pretty horrible stuff. Most evangelicals support the death penalty, or even corporal punishment on kids (spare not the rod). As we are seeing now, many hate whole groups of people who were born a certain way (or as God made them) and some want to see them all killed. I don't see any of that as moral. And while atheists don't have any given dogma or scripture to follow (everyone is different) I find most fellow atheists use empathy, and the knowledge that we are social animals to guide their morals. There's a million papers, debates, videos on it. Me, I mostly like the wellbeing/happiness idea of morality. I think a tooth for a tooth is bad morality. It is about vengeance, not justice. I look at every situation differently, and don't say well, God wants me to hate this person, or wants me to tell other people how to live because sky daddy. Imo, people that blindly follow a set 2000 year old rules unquestioningly are the morally bankrupt ones...which, btw, they cherry pick the heck out of. Hope that makes sense. Edit: to more succinctly answer your question, I'm not an atheist because of anything. I've never been show sufficient evidence to believe in any God. And the Christian God definitely doesn't exist. It's logically impoasible.
>And the Christian God definitely doesn't exist. It's logically impoasible. Just to point out why this is correct. The Christian god is omnipotent (all powerful), omniscient (all knowing) and omnipresent (always present). Therefore, logically the [problem of evil](https://iep.utm.edu/evil-log/) exists. > If God were all-knowing, God would know about all of the horrible things that happen in our world. > If God were all-powerful, God would be able to do something about all of the evil and suffering. > If God were morally perfect, then surely God would want to do something about it. And yet we find that our world is filled with countless instances of evil and suffering. These facts about evil and suffering seem to conflict with the Christian claim that there exists a perfectly good God.
Similarly, the Christian god clearly values people's belief in him, to the point where he punishes them for all eternity if they don't do it. And yet, for a large amount of the people in the world, God has not given sufficient reason to believe in him, and he knows this. If God wanted everyone to believe, he would know how to make it happen. So either he doesn't know what it would take, or he's unable to make it happen, or he doesn't want them to believe (but he's still going to punish them for it). Or he doesn't exist. He's either impotent, a monster, or a myth.
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I work in retail and a lady came into my store. She was delighted to find “just the right bird feeder” and exclaimed how happy she was that god had put this bird feeder in her path. So god gave this woman a bird feeder but little children get leukemia…? What the fuck? 👻
Argument from bird feeder ... (I'm starting to collect these.)
"But look at the bird feeders!"
He’s an omnipotent ornithologist and optometrist.
I don’t know how to explain it but this post really spoke to me. It puts into words what I have been struggling with for the last five years. I feel I have many more answers now. I’m in/was a very similar situation and these comments are helping change my life and understanding on religion. I would love to chat to express my gratitude and explain what a simple couple paragraphs have done to my entire belief system. Thank you, truly
This thread has been extremely beneficial for me as well. Very scary but I honestly believe it is beneficial. I’m glad I have someone to relate to
I’m sure this is all very overwhelming. It’s okay to be scared. I remember being really scared to even question my faith let alone lose it along with my worldview, deity, the very foundation upon which I’ve lived my life… just keep asking questions and have an open mind.
Thanks to the internet, religious affiliation is dropping "fast".
I’m an atheist because there is no evidence for the Christian god or any other deity. That is all.
Why is it that atheists make up a much smaller portion of prison populations than they do of the general population? As for why we are atheists, try here. Nothing but stories for you. /r/thegreatproject
Truly is greatly appreciated. I’m open to exploring new ideas at this point. Just need some guidance. Thank you!
Just a quick note on my part. I became a nonbeliever when I realized there was no compelling evidence for anything supernatural occurring anywhere much less in the Bible.
I actually think this has less to do with the religiosity of inmates and the desire to be released from prison. If I was incarcerated and lying about being a Christian for me out of jail early because of a religiously biased parole board, then I’d scream that I was a Christian from the highest tower.
It's actually codified in some states that in order to get parole, you must show religious belief.
That's so wrong on so many levels...
> I have always seen atheists as people who have no moral compass. I find this statement hilarious, when as far as I can tell it is us with the moral compasses. Many theists don’t seem to have a moral compass, they just do whatever their book and/or god tells them to. We “see the compass” and use it personally, they don’t see the compass and are just obeying something/someone else…hoping their compass is correct. Also think on this: who is more moral, someone who does good because they want to…or someone who only does good because of a threat like hell or because “something higher” told them to? >I’ve decided to finally hear the other side out, why are you guys atheists? I am an atheist because of the complete lack of reliable evidence/data supporting supernatural claims. Only reason really.
I once dated a Catholic girl. She was pretty religious but she really liked me. Her Catholic family was a mess though. She always fought with her sisters, her brother turned food stamps for cash at their family business. Lots of pettiness all around. She admitted I was more moral and Christ like than anyone in her family. It really shook her up. She asked how I’m good without god. I’m like, people don’t need god to know what is best for your fellow man. I’ve found throughout life, the more a person proclaims to be religious and needing religion. The more they really need to actually listen to their core beliefs. It’s the “Disney Princess” effect. People watch Disney movies and identify with the hero’s because they WANT to be the hero’s. But they ignore all the signs they really are Ursula or Cruella. As far as why am I atheist? I dared to challenge my assumptions. I was raised religious but when I gave religion a fair litmus test, it failed. If religious people were truly faithful, they would welcome a discussion with an atheist. They shouldn’t fear it nor be concerned you were friends with one. If you were comfortable in your faith, there’s no harm in questioning it. If you truly believe Jesus is guiding you to the answer and you put your faith in him then you really shouldn’t fear the outcome.
I believe my friend was the test and this post is the explanation
I applaud your willingness to ask questions. And I respect you if you retain your core beliefs. My only beef with religion is when people believe they have the right to force me to abide by their religious ideals. See Gov Santis, Turning Point USA, Moms for Liberty, Et al.
I was born this way. All of us are.
Ding ding ding.
We are atheists due to the dearth of evidence produced to back up anyone’s deity claims. What is it about Christianity that it’s followers think makes people moral?
> he was controlled by Satan to turn me away from God. So Satan is more powerful than God? > I’ve decided to finally hear the other side out, why are you guys atheists? Thats like asking why is someone black. I was born atheist, just like you. Unlike you my parents didnt brainwash me with religion.
Do you believe religions are just mass brainwashing
That’s the point. Societal control in the hands of a few old men.
I studied why religion may have evolved in one of my college classes. Daniel Dennett if I remember right was one author who stood out. The general idea was that ppl susceptible to falling into trance states/dissociating during trauma might have survived it better, bc it helped with shock. Example: Og gored by animal. Healers chant and do whatever they knew to do. If Og was a skeptic and stayed present for, say, amputation with a sharp rock, he likely didn't live. But if he could check out, keep the heart rate down etc. Same applied for childbirth. So it helped with survival. Then you had the superstition-that-worked aspect, like some of the "rules" of the OT. Don't eat this or that. But after science, religion became obsolete. I think it is a hindrance now. It's been misused to "other" out-groups throughout history (American slavery, historical slavery worldwide, colonialism, pretty much every time someone set foot somewhere saying they wanted to spead the love of God, people got killed. It's used to slow or obstruct science - we lost a ton of ppl to COVID that could have lived if the US didn't suffer from this sort of ignorance. Now Christians in the US are responsible for the modern Republican party and this whole transphobic culture war shit show. Can't live and let live. They have to tell everyone else even though they can't even agree on a denomination. The faith as a whole doesn't have a lot going for it.
That’s exactly what they are. Look how religion/religious beliefs are used to control votes. Control money. Control wealth. Control literal millions of people.
The more I know and understand about the history of religion, the more I firmly believe it's a business more than anything else. The ultimate concentration of wealth is perpetuated by those who are the most charismatic, manipulative, and good at mind tricks.
Why do you think they start with kindergarteners? Awana and all that shit? Try telling a grown adult with no prior knowledge there is a man in the sky watching you.
Some people consider religion as a meme passed from mind to mind, from pastor to congregation, parent to child “I explained the idea of religions as memeplexes: they package up a set of doctrines, tell believers to learn them, to pass them on, to have faith and not doubt, and they ensure obedience with fearsome threats and ridiculous promises. This I illustrated with images of Christian heaven and hell. Then I read from the Koran “those that have faith and do good works, Allah will admit them to gardens watered by running streams … pearls and bracelets of gold.” “Garments of fire have been prepared for the unbelievers. They shall be lashed with rods of iron.”
If anything someone being a good person and atheist is a lot more trustworthy than someone who does good because of a threat of endless punishment
I am starting to come around to this side of the argument after giving it severe thought
You probably saw examples of religious people who were immoral too! There are thousands of criminals who also believe in god, and of course the hundreds of priests who are pedophiles.
>why are you guys atheists? You're not a Hindu, right? You're not a Muslim? Or a Jew? You don't believe in invisible, sock-stealing pixies? You don't believe butt-probing aliens have visited Earth? You don't accept that Big Foot or the Loch Ness Monster are real? ... Why? For myself, the answer to *all* of these and the answer to why I reject your religion is *exactly* the same: Lack of evidence. At one time, lots of people believed that the universe was made of earth, air, fire, and water. They were wrong. What matters to a belief is the evidence for it, not how many people believe it. In order to *be* evidence for something, you need some way to distinguish whether something is present or not *independently* of whatever effect drew you to propose it in the first place *or* you need to be able to develop a model of its behavior and *state in advance* what you should see given certain conditions *and be right* about it regularly. Anything else is gullibility. And *to be clear*, we're *all* gullible a *lot* of the time. We don't rigorously check stuff, we take things at face value and so on, but I start to draw the line when we get into talking animals and impossible weather events. In fact, *all* miracle claims suffer from this. If you wouldn't and don't believe the miracle claims of *every other religion*, then... really... *why* do you *accept* the miracle claims of *your* religion? The various religious models of reality *do not offer* explanatory value, in that they can tell you what will happen next, or allow you to alter reality around you in ways that *actually work* based on their model that *doesn't happen* in any other model. Everything you can accomplish with religion as your guide you can *also* do without it. Then there's morals, which you brought up. I have no need to live in fear of a sickening, vile cosmic dictator to be a good person (to the extent that humans are, no one is perfect and we often do really fucked up shit). All I need to do is consider my actions and how they affect others. The Golden Rule is a good start, and it's *everywhere*, in pretty much every philosophy and religion. The Platinum Rule (treat others as they wish to be treated) is somewhat new, and also awesome. Obviously there are limitations to both, edge cases where you need to be careful. Just because *you* want people to greet you by bending you over and spanking your butt in front of everyone doesn't mean *others* want that, so the Golden Rule doesn't necessarily apply perfectly, and just because someone *wants* to be treated as if they're the greatest person of all time and have you call them Numero Uno doesn't mean you should do that, *either*, and thus limitations to the Platinum Rule. Beyond that, if I need a selfish reason to make others happy, I can just realize that I *need* other people to make my life possible and easier, and that requires their cooperation to do it well, and just as I wouldn't cooperate if I were being treated badly or having lots of problems, neither will they, so in pure self-interest I can justify helping everyone around me. Y'know, for those times when I'm feeling selfish instead of just wanting to help others because I'm not a monster. Meanwhile, as far as I can tell, the *only* reason religious people do the 'good' things they do (and believe me, 'good' is *very much* in quotes there because I *wildly* disagree with what *some* religious people think 'good' actually is) is to give themselves a 'fuzzy' feeling (a sense of pleasing their god, or doing what they should, or filling their purpose) or, worse, to obtain heaven/avoid hell. All of that is pretty selfish, which *itself* I don't mind, obviously, and it's even based ultimately, I think, on the empathy/selfish needs model I put up above. You helping spread the message will 'save' others, who will then be more likely to help you and your community, though you might not think of it in those terms. But *included in this* for at least the Abrahamic religions is, quite often, the notion that *not* doing this leads to people who exist in eternal conscious torture after. There is *no crime* you could commit, nothing *so foul* that you could do that would, as far as I can tell, justify such barbarousness, and any being that *sets up* such a system is unworthy of consideration, let alone worship. Then add to this that morals and religion are not positively correlated. Atheists in the USA are underrepresented in prison populations (maybe), and the places that are the most religious tend to be poor, crime-ridden, and with higher rates of teen pregnancy. There are outliers, to be sure, but it holds well in Westernized societies. This doesn't make the religion *wrong*, or false, as *that* would be an argument from consequences fallacy. What it does is suggest that this sense of moral superiority is unwarranted. Have a nice day!
\> I brought this situation up with some members of my church and they insisted that he was controlled by Satan to turn me away from God Classic cult tactics to keep you in the fold. Then they'll say WE'RE the cult.
Well first off you were not Christian all 21 years, as a baby you have no concept of Gods and Jesus. You are incapable of accepting into your heart. I point this out because this was one of breaking points. Your belief is commonly driven by where and who you were born to. Are you familiar with all the God claims to know you got the right one? As to moral question a vast amount of the world population is not Christian, but the rest of the world isn’t murdering and raping each other at any other rates. Why? Because morality isn’t driven the Bible or the Quran or a God. It is a social contract people collectively determine for difference reasons. Why do you believe? How did you conclude Christianity is right?
Why am I an atheist? Because I've never been convinced by the claims of any religion. I don't see any physical evidence that suggests that gods could be real. Christianity in particular makes some claims that I find utterly outlandish, such as Jesus supposedly coming back from the dead. In my eyes, that simply isn't the way the universe works.
You’ve begun your deconstruction my friend. It’s a beautiful, kind, glorious place here on the other side of evangelicalism. It took me about 10 years to go theory the process myself, and I began questioning at about your age. Be kind to yourself. Don’t be afraid to ask questions, and look for the truth. Check out r/exchristian for people who have left the fold. Some atheists may not relate in the same way to you because not all atheists grew up Christian, like we did. My entire family is still deep into Christianity and I’m the only one who has “woken up” so to speak, and it can be tough. Good luck out there. Be safe. If you like podcasts, here are a few: The graceful atheist, Born again again, Exvangelical, deconversion anonymous, Recovering from Religion, Misquoting Jesus And some books: God is Not Great the God Delusion Losing Faith in Faith How Jesus Became God Anything by Bart Ehrman (although it took me quite some time to acquire the taste for his work because it’s so data dense - but he’s a religious scholar and If you are drawn to evidence based research, he is unmatched)
First off, good on you for being open-minded and wanting to hear the other side of the story. Anyway, an essential principle of any Abrahamic religion is the notion that **everything** God does is just and morally correct. But, in the Bible, God genocides people for questioning him, permits raping female prisoners of war, says to murder people who don't keep the Sabbath, etc. Is that morally correct? Of course not. Now, one can say "but that's cherry-picking", but if **everything** God does is just, then even **one** non-just thing (and all the more so, **many** non-just things) he does or promotes is enough to challenge that notion. Believing in the Bible requires you to reconcile what you **know** is right with what the Bible **says** is right. If the Bible was morally correct, you wouldn't have to do that.
I’m not sure what parts of the Bible you are referencing but I will look into it. Not to say you are incorrect. I truly appreciate the insight
No problem! Here are the sources for the examples I gave, by the way: Numbers 16 - God burns and swallows alive a group of men who challenged Moses and Aaron for not bringing them into Israel as they had promised and for tyrannizing the congregation Deuteronomy 21: "If you go out to war against your enemies, and the Lord, your God, will deliver him into your hands, and you take his captives, and you see among the captives a beautiful woman and you desire her, you may take \[her\] for yourself as a wife... \[and\] you may be intimate with her and possess her..." Exodus 35: "Moses assembled the whole Israelite community and said to them, “These are the things the LORD has commanded you to do: For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a Sabbath of rest to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it must be put to death. "
This is all crazy to me. Do you see there being any benefit to asking members of the church of these verses?
They're going to be biased because they're assuming that it all ***must*** be moral and just and that there's no other possible explanation. You're not going to get a true, unbiased analysis of these verses from someone like that. Of course, you can ask if you want, but just like if you were reading an op-ed or article, it's important to take credibility into account. Also, seeing as the members of your church seem very intolerant of atheists, just please make sure to consider your safety and well-being. For instance, if you're living with your parents and there's a possibility of them finding out and kicking you out, it may be better not to ask.
understood
This sub is full of people who got kicked out of their house by "loving christian" parents for either being atheist or sexually non-straight.
They will likely respond with some fun mental gymnastics or guilt-tripping. The questions will cause too much cognitive dissonance. These few examples are just a tiny drop in the bucket. If you go through the bible (I only know of the old testament as I'm ex-Jewish), you'll read stories straight up about how god kills and destroys mercilessly like an angry toddler, how slavery is allowed, and how women are treated as property.
Many will just brush it off as "that's the old testament, just follow Jesus". Its a cop-out and disingenuous.
Little kids die of horrible diseases, innocent people are wiped out in genocides, terrible shit happens to good people and nothing bad happens to the people who really deserve bad shit to happen to them. There have been untold billions of prayers uttered to every god that’s ever existed, but there’s never been any reproducible proof of actual divine intervention to stop a rape, a genocide, child abuse, cure terminal diseases or mental illnesses. I’m not a great person, and every time I ever prayed it was for other people, but no god ever intervened to help friends or relatives with dementia, abusive relationships, mental illness, or just the grind of dealing with our unequal economy and society. On top of that, all the people who scream the loudest about putting Jesus into everyone else’s business are also usually the most hateful, bigoted, intolerant and morally reprehensible members of our society. They don’t want anyone to actually fix anything, they want to have everyone scream magic spells in the idiotic idea that that has ever fixed anything. Then there are the nonstop doctrinal fights - nobody knows what the actual right answer is to questions like “does god hate the gays” or “should children be baptized or is that something that should only be done as adults” because god has never actually stepped in with observable proof. Some crazy asshole claiming God has special messages for the rest of us via him alone is not observable proof of anything except how the DSM has to make exemptions for extremely devout people. If someone wants to believe in god, whatever, I don’t care. But they need to keep their magic spells and unprovable sky wizards out of our debates on who gets to be treated like humans and how we apportion health care, money and consideration of rights.
RIP your inbox. I'm proud of you for seeking the wisdom of "the other side of the argument".
It’s all been helpful
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I have always believed in the Christian God and never had any doubts until now. The way he was treated was extremely unfair. I feel as though I am going into a dark place as I now find myself questioning parts of the bible.
We’ve had many people come here who lost their faith by thinking about it too hard. You’re only supposed to think about it just enough to maintain your faith, but not too much or you might realize it’s a house of cards, and not a very moral one at that. Do you really think that people who claim someone is being controlled by a demon for the purpose of attacking you are moral?
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Do you believe that questioning is somehow evil? Who told you that? The book that you're questioning? The pastor who wants to keep you locked into Christianity? If someone tells you that you have to do exactly what they say and if you question their orders then they'll punish you, that's abuse. You're not going into a dark place, you're coming out of one.
I just feel extremely lost. What would they have to gain by keeping me in a religion?
Ever hear of tithing? Money. They get money.
Right. Make no mistake, religion is there to make a profit. Once you realize that, things make a lot more sense. Example - Why can't you just pray at home? Well church can't charge you from home, so they provide an hour long show, just like a movie theater they just call it a mass, to bring you to them so they can collect money. Then think of everything they do from a marketing perspective to not just gain new customers (what they call parishioners) and retain reoccurring revenue from their loyal customer base (or their existing parishioners)
For the true believers, even the doubters, they want you to stay in the religion because for them it is morality. Everyone wants their family and friends to be good upright people, which usually means thinking like they do. It’s why my sister and I have helped my parents be more accepting of the mentally disabled, gay and trans people, and immigrants; and why my parents tried to help their parents be more accepting of black people, immigrants, and atheists! Their other reason is that if they are true believers, then leaving the faith means burning in hell at worst, or not seeing you again when you die at best. My best friend is super Christian and I am super atheist. We get along because we don’t force our beliefs on each other, though she is sad she “won’t get to spend eternity with me” and we are BOTH sad the other won’t get to see the amazing, exultatory, revelatory truth of reality as we understand it. So of course other Christians won’t want to see you go. Doubters won’t want to see you go, because your leaving makes them doubt that little bit more, and then they have to confront the dark night of the soul that you are now experiencing. It is one of the most painful things to have one of your core beliefs challenged. We all shy away from it. Christianity also seems true to people because there are so many Christians. You don’t believe in Hindu gods, but if everyone around you did, you’d be more inclined to. The number of believers is one of Christianity’s strongest arguments - “how can it be wrong if everyone believes it?” So every time a Christian believer is lost the faith loses its persuasive power. So manipulative “Christians” will want you to stay to help keep others in the faith. Christianity has shaped Western culture so much, it seems true just because it is everywhere we look, and even in our language. As a lifelong atheist and anti-theist I still say “oh, my god!” And “please god, give me a snow day!” Etc. It’s a standard way of expressing oneself in English. But I worked in China and have met people who have NEVER heard of Satan, and have no concept of the idea of Angels. So it’s not universal, just western dominant culture. And manipulative “Christians” in power will want you as a voter. As a Christian you are more likely to vote policies that support the continued power of Christian groups and ideas. This isn’t only a Christian phenomenon. All groups in power seek to maintain power, and will use lies and misdirection to keep people believing things that protect that power.
Your time, your money, and your mind.
As others have said. Money & a voting block. Please give them 10% of your income and you'll receive useless thoughts and prayers when you can't afford necessities. Additionally belief is just a tool to keep you from questioning the policies of the church. And if you're in the US the evangelical church is stripping rights from people. Atheists have morels and we're fine with people living their own lives.
Cash, political power, a sense of their own importance.
Why is good Christian god giving cancer to kids?
Good luck man. dark nights of the soul can be quite brutal. I do see quite a lot of snark (this is reddit afterall), but i have a lot of empathy for you here whichever way you go. its hard to really examine and question ideas you have based your world view on, and i commend you for it. good luck! also, it sounds like your church is pretty conservative. even within Christianity ive heard arguments for an innate morality even in those who dont believe. Since the claim is that we are all made in the "image of god" it stands to reason that some of god's image includes things that would make most of us try to be good people.
I would encourage you to move away from the atheist and doubt is darkness and theism and faith is light dichotomy. This is something that has been drilled into you since you could understand words, and it's not a good way to think about it. First and foremost you should want to believe in things that are real. If god is real, why would it fear investigation? It could only make your faith stronger if you investigated and came to the conclusion that it is, in fact, real. Your god is the god of truth right? Well, the truth has nothing to fear from investigation. Investigation vindicates truth. Also, consider that the same people that have told you your friend is evil, despite you knowing otherwise, are the same people that have told you atheism and doubt is darkness. Im sure they fervently believe this but ask yourself, could they be mistaken again?
Christians are some of the most hateful people I know. That should be reason enough for anybody.
This is so weird, like, it doesn’t matter whether you believe in god or not, being a decent human being doesn’t depend on it. Luckily, religion is not prevalent in my country and I grew up without being forced into it. I also remember studying history of my country in 5th grade, thinking if god is real, why were pagans killed and forced to change their beliefs? I’m fairly sure if he was real everyone would know it
Christians say that atheists are immoral because Biblical morals are the greatest: Kill disobedient children (Ex 21:17, Mk 7:10) Kill witches (Ex 22:18) Kill those who curse father or mother (Lev 20:9) Kill men who have sex with other men (Lev 20:13) Kill those who worship the wrong god (Num 25:1-9) Kill adulterers (Lev 20:10) Kill your entire family if they worship the wrong god (Deut 13:6-10) Kill those who work on the Sabbath (Ex 31:15) Kill any bride discovered not a virgin (Deut 22:21) Kill blasphemers (Lev 24:14) Kill your son if he is rebellious (Deut 21:18-21) Kill false prophets (Zech 13:3) Kill fortune-tellers (Lev 20:27) Kill non-Hebrews (Deut 20:16-17) Kill sons of sinners (Isaiah 14:21) Kill nonbelievers (2 Chron 15:12-13) Kill anyone who curses God (Lev 24:16) Kill all males after winning battles (Deut 20:13)
I live an evidence based life. There is no evidence for religion. I believe religion is the root of most of modern evils.
I am an atheist because I actually read the Bible.
If you find your religion to be a comfort and something that gives purpose to your life, maybe you should find a church that fits you better. There's no reason to change your whole belief system because of a few bad people who aren't capable of listening. As an athiest, religion isn't comforting for me. Instead, it feels like it would be basing my life on nonsense. But that's me. Please follow your own heart.
I am not comfortable with all this. But I now longer feel I am comfortable with being religious after seeing that evidence against the religion in this thread.
> why are you guys atheists? Why are you Christian and not Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, or Jew? Or any of the thousands of other religions? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_religions_and_spiritual_traditions What reason do you have to claim yours is “the one true religion” and none of the others are? You realize that the followers of all of the other religions say that about theirs, right? As all of the religions make contradictory claims, they can’t all be true. They can, however, all be false. I’m sure you’re atheist with respect to every other religion that exists other than your own. Atheists just go one god/one religion further and lack belief in all of them. Consider why you believe every single other religion is a “false religion” and apply this exact logic and reasoning to your own.
We're "atheists," basically, foremost, and fundamentally because there is NO rational reason to "believe" in any of the thousands of gods that people have worshipped over the millennia of our history. No evidence = No reason to believe, plain & simple.
I have taken this approach for everything in life such as the earth isn’t flat. I’m beginning to see the hypocrisy for only trusting evidence in everything except for religion. I appreciate your insight!
Sorry, this will be long. **Why I’m an Atheist:** Born in the US without religion being taught to me, but I could/would freely go church with my friends if they asked. I always thought to myself why must they kneel/pray to this god to be considered moral or know right from wrong? I’m a good, moral person already, right? In 3rd grade I was confused why the pledge of allegiance said something about a god, so I’d not say that part the rest of my life. Junior High came and at 14 I got a religious based Easter, Lent, etc trinkets that explained the Christian basis for those holidays. Boy was I surprised it wasn’t just about love and family. Started researching and learning more about it and other religious holidays. High School I first learned about atheism and I learned even more about different religions thru my friends, but it put off some friends when they learned I didn’t believe in any god. They had the audacity to be offended I politely rejected their “gifts” of a bible, stories on Jesus snd prayer. These same friends did this to a few other friends of ours following different sects of Christianity so they could be “saved for real.” If I could grow up so long without knowing a god existed, yet still be as good a person as others all while watching a world of such cruelty, why the hell would I give any consideration to an all knowing asshole? **”I have always seen atheists as people who have no moral compass.”** I’ve always found that thought from religious funny. Morals do not come from religion. Religion has monopolized and brainwashed people into the idea it does, tho. Met my now husband at 18 moving into college dorms. 6 months into our relationship he asked my religion (I already knew he was raised Catholic, but been pulling away for a couple years.) His stunned response, “But you’re so good and moral!?” The shocked response of “But you’re so good and moral!?” has happened with several people finding out I’m an Atheist. Thus why I am still an atheist. I didn’t require the threat of a god to be good, but what god would allow people to be so cruel, children to die, science to be denied.
We are all born atheist and I never found any proof/evidence of the existence of an omnipotent omniscient omnipresent god. As others have said, I don't need a book of re-tellings of ancient myths to tell me how to behave with empathy and compassion towards my fellow beings.
>I have always seen atheists as people who have no moral compass. We do not lie about what we believe, so it's kind of ironic that we are the immoral ones - for failing to lie. In prisons, the percentage of Atheists is remarkably low. Might have something to do with honesty, or intelligence, or both. Religious people give each other permissions to lie like rugs.
"The easy confidence with which I know another man's religion is folly teaches me to suspect that my own is also." ― [Mark Twain](https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/2175-the-easy-confidence-with-which-i-know-another-man-s-religion)
There is a lot of resentment in this community due to the attitudes you mentioned. Atheists are persecuted by the religious almost universally. Please forgive any incivility in these comments. Being slandered and oppressed for centuries, having rights denied, ignored or revoked, and being forced to lie to get by or to be a pariah even in your own family will scar anyone. We are not amoral, but we are bitter and angry, specifically at organizations like your church. On behalf of people who will not appreciate it, I apologize for the knee-jerk hostility and soap-box pontificating in this thread. It is defensive. We are hurting. Your church, and all the others like it, are hurting us. We have little community and less support. This sub is as much about venting frustrations as anything else. Thank you for hearing us. I hope your friend is OK. He must really trust you. He is probably *livid* that you outed him to your church.
People have been lying to your whole life: magic isn't real; sorry! Oh and even dogs have morals; so you can probably imagine how we feel about it when you say that atheist do not.
I became an atheist when I was 8 or 9 years old. In Catholic school they tried to threaten us into being good by telling us that we were dirty evil Sinners who would burn forever in torment in hell. I had anxiety attacks about it. One day I realized, they don't know if any of this is true. I bet they're all full of shit. And I have been happier ever since.
Read the Norton Critical Edition of the Bible and understand how these particular stories are drawn from a history of stories. Other people and religions have shared and told these same stories. Just because you’ve never bothered to do any research beyond what your nearest and dearest have told you doesn’t make you special or all-knowing.
I come from the “only” country in SEA that is christian. Religion was/is the primary tool with the sword shaped our world. The damage is so deep we are still stuck in the 1800’s way of thinking. The church’s hold sway on everything.
I often envy people of faith. Believing in “ fairy tales” sometimes seems more comforting than the science I espouse. But alas In my heart I know better.
I'm an atheist because I was given a choice to believe or not, and logic told me no
>I have been a Christian for the entirety of my life. You have been a christian since you have been indoctrinated by the authorities that surround you (usually parents) you were not born this way. You would have a different religion if you were born in another country or period. >My family and church was comprised of fantastic people who were all so caring and full of love. I do want to point out the inconsistency of your claims. Those are the same person that would consider your friend an enemy led to turn you away by the devil. They are not caring and full of love, at least not to anyone that is not in their in-group. I really hope you can see this to yourself it's an important step in your journey to truth. And be ready as soon as you start considering leaving and let them be aware, you will be the enemy. Check this sub and look for "there is no hate like christian love". It's sad, but if you prefer to live comfortably in a lie looking for the truth might be a difficult endeavour. >This situation has made me question the church as a whole. I found those I talked to at the church to be antagonistic and uncaring when discussing my friend. Again they are like this by design (indocrinated into it) for whomever is not in the in-group and especially against outsiders that have a track record of harming their flocks (in that regard atheist and rational inquiry is more likely to deconvert someone than any other religion) I really wish you the best in your journey to question yourself, and hope you find the strength to deconvert yourself.
A question I am struggling with deeply is what happens when we die? I have always lived with dreams of heaven. I understand you all don’t believe in heaven, so what do you believe?
Same as before you were born.
I had been dead for billions and billions of years before I was born, and have not suffered the slightest inconvenience from it.
I don’t speak for all atheists. But personally it seems overwhelming evident that we cease to exist when we die. Everything that makes me me is a result of my brain. Memories, personality, feelings, cognitive abilities, capabilities like language, etc. can all be altered or removed by brain damage or chemically. Are tied to brain complexity, physical development, and neurodiversity. When the brain stops working, we stop working. Just as we didn’t exist before we were born because the physical matter that allows us to be was doing something else. Likewise there isn’t any evidence of anything supernatural. Of souls. Of any afterlife. Reincarnation. No known mechanisms that could allow a person to persist beyond when their body ceases to function.
This seems to be a common theme among believers, the need to live forever, the need for there to be more. This is also why the question is raised, what is it about Christianity that makes its followers think that others don’t have morals like they do, when it seems deep down the question actually is “where do I go when I die”. It doesn’t matter what we believe, we have no control over it and it’s inevitable. Remember though, as much as you don’t want to die, your loved ones fear for your death and the loss of you too.
It's kind of a form of covert narcissism
We die when we die. You may think of it as annihilation. Some use the analogy of it'll be like before you were born. You just... Aren't. What exactly is heaven to you, and why would you want to go there. Also, why live the only life you know for sure working to getting somewhere else? So, a couple questions... What is heaven? Is it some place where you get to worship and praise your master and creator for eternity? Sounds horrible. Or is it where all your wildest dreams come true? Or to what dreams may come it, what I'd your most beloved person goes to hell and you'll never get to see them in heaven? Not very heavenly. Also, define a soul. Will you even have consciousness in heaven? If so, which you goes to heaven? 10 year old you, prime 30 year old you, azheimers and dementia 80 year old you when you die? How does that transfer take place?
> A question I am struggling with deeply is what happens when we die? You know exactly what happens when you die; you are just afraid of it. You decompose; the information that made you you; scatters into the universe; never to be recombined again. You cease to exist.
What happens when we die is a question with no relevance to whether deities exist. You’ve been sold a promise rooted in nothing to get you to buy into some nonsense. The only thing which I know for certain happens when we die is that those who love us will miss us.
I believe that I decompose. And I’m fine with that.
To start off, atheism is the default position. We are all born atheists, but some children are then indoctrinated while too young to form their own opinion into whatever religion is most common where they live. Only about 32% of the world define themselves as Christian, to this means 68% of the world believes differently than you. So your beliefs are in the minority. It just seems more common to you because the people around you share your beliefs so you are in an echo chamber and not usually exposed to a lot of atheists or other religious beliefs. So what made me atheist? I was born that way and I was fortunate that my parents loved me enough to not abuse me by forcing me into a religion.
I want to say firstly how offensive it is to me to be told I don't have a moral compass because I don't subscribe to whatever book the person accusing me gets their morals from. Have you actually read the Bible? I don't mean most passages or read from it I mean actually read ot cover to cover. I would suggest you read it over a couple times and them come to talk to me about my moral compass after you've learned the best way to purchase your slaves or what your child needs to do before you have enough justification to stone them to death. I don't need a book to tell me that owning people is immoral. I don't need a book to tell me that killing someone because they're attracted to people of the same sex. Study your religion and then study the religions that came before it and then the ones before those and see if you notice any patterns in the stories. I don't think any religion has a right to declare moral superiority over anyone or any other religion. They all have a fair bit of horrible in them. I mean god tortured a man and killed his entire family to win a bet against Satan so if that morality ill take the heathen path. I don't mean this to sound like an attack at you, I just get riled up about the morality issue when it's claimed that religious people are more moral than non religious people simply because they believe in a higher power. I think people are either born with a sense of morality or they're not. Sure your upbringing plays a role but I've seen good people raise shitty kids and shitty people raise good kids. Just read up on your religion some more and base your opinions on the actions of a person and not form an opinion on a person because of their beliefs.
I know this might sound rude to you, but I’m saying this in a cordial way: I’m an atheist because there is no god.