Athiests, did your parents tell you there was no God?

Question

Alot of you answered that Christianity is passed down from our parents, so let me ask you the reverse.Did your parents neglect to take you to church and teach you about Jesus?

Answer 1

No one explained to me about the MEANING of the bible stories. Without a strong homelife and family and no comprehension of the meanings behind the words, I saw the hypocrisy of those claiming to be religious and came to equate ALL religion with stupid fairy tales for idiots and sexual deviates to believe in... certainly not a person of intelligence and reason like myself.... during my late 20's and early 30's a series of devastating events brought me to a point of desparation where I went from athiest to agnostic and not I do have a relationship with the god of MY understanding and I am no longer an athiest nor an agnostic.

Life happens.

It is tough to teach any of this stuff because people are programmed to NOT change unless driven to their knees.

Answer 2

Again, when questions are directed at Atheists, I don't know if I'm included. Am I what people call agnostic?

But to answer your question, no. My parents were in fact very religious and I grew up reading on all the religious books. I loved praying the rosary. I even led a retreat.

But what I can never take is that blind look at doctrine, and the refusal to be open to ideas outside of what they have been thought.

Blind faith? Faith is never blind. If a person closes his eyes to facts, its because he is afraid that if he acknowledges them, he will suddenly not believe in God.

Well I believe in the evolution, so do many Catholics. I believe that the Bible tells us how to go to heaven not how the heavens work, as did Galileo. It is not important to me that there was no mount anywhere near the place where the sermon on the mount occurred. I believe that even if I should learn that Noah never built the ark and that there was no great flood, this does not mean there is no God, but just that several unimportant facts recorded in the Bible were wrong.

People should not confuse faith with a refusal to examine and review what it is that we believe in. For goodness sake, what would separate the blind Christian from suicide bombers!

Answer 3

That is not neglect. We are a non religious family. I was born and raised who I am. My parents DID allow me to make my own decisions about what I believe. They sent me to church for a time with neighbors so I'd have a chance to see it and be better able to make my own decision (more then what most any religious family would probably do in the opposite...), and I also did vacation bible school two summers in my life. But, alas, I was never a believer.

Your religion is not a requirement for life. And why to you also presume that Christianity is automatically the one and only, that it would have to be Jesus and friends. Why not any other?

Answer 4

No. My parents hauled me off to Church EVERY sunday. I went to a Christian School all my life and then went to a Catholic College.
I spent 2 years traveling in Europe, and it was an incredible eye opener. I talked to many people about my questions of the Bible,God, and Christianity. I knew about other religions and I wanted to find out why they believed what they did. How did they know that Islam, Judism, Buddism etc...was the perfect and right religion? After a long journey and speaking to hundreds of people, I came to the conclusion that organized religion was a big problem, especially in the United States.

Religion fails to teach humanity, peace, and a practical solution to mankind. It hides and mocks science who have done more to explain the reason for our existance that religion who explains with a fairy tale book and a god to blame things for when things go wrong.

Answer 5

No, my parents were christians and insisted I go to church. Eventually, being a bright child, I took to reading the bible on my own time, curious to find out what was on all those hundreds of pages that Sunday school and church didn't touch upon. I soon found that the loving, compassionate god they talked about in church was capable of all sorts of heinous acts against men, women and even innocent children, all out of proportion to their transgressions. In any case, I became disillusioned at a very young age. I am now highly educated and very comfortable with my understanding of this world. My exposure to religion is just a dark footnote in my past

Answer 6

My parents never said there wasn't a god, but they never really talked about religion with me as a child. The only person who would talk to me about Christianity was my grandmother. I didn't start attending church until I was 12-13, and I went because I wanted to. I am now agnostic.

Answer 7

my mother is religious, my dad is not. He's just spiritual. They took me to church when I was little and then stopped. They always told me and my siblings to believe what we wanted. They didn't push religion on us. I didn't want to learn about religion so they stopped.

my parents 1st born son was 11 when he died. He was hit by a truck while riding a bike. They adopted me 2 years later. I was suposed to be ready but it actually took an extra few months until I actually arrived home with them. Which happened to be the exact day of his death 2 years ago. They have always said that I am a "gift" from him. It was totally random and weird that I arrived on that day.

Also, when I was born I had major heart surgery and had a less than 50% chance to live through it, and continue to live healthy after it. I also had ADD and ADHD. I was rejected from the Coast Guard and Army due to these things. (I didn't want to be in either branch anyways) but then they told my grandfather right before he died I wanted to join the Air Force. (He had a major important job in the military. Top secret I guess. No one know what he did) He died and I (shortly after his death) was accepted into the Air Force. My mom thinks that my grandfather had soemthing to do with it. (in heaven)


...I'm still an atheist.

Answer 8

I was raised and baptised as a Christian but unlike my family,
I took the time out to learn what other religions preach and also question many of the contents of the Bible. When the answers did not add up I figured the rest out on my own.

Answer 9

Nope. Actually I was taken to church as a child. When I got older 10-14 I went on my own. I am not atheist, I'm agnostic, leaning closer to atheism everyday. But, to answer your question, my beliefs, or lack there of, were not passed down to me. Kind like my mom told me there was a Santa Claus, but I got older and wiser and figured out he didn't exist on my own. Do you still believe in Santa?

Answer 10

Hardly. I'm the son of a Methodist minister, and I majored in religion myself before spending a year in seminary. I studied Hebrew & Greek.

Reason is the reason I gave up the idea of God. While God's existence cannot be proven or disproven, the evidence compels me to conclude it's extremely unlikely that anything close to a Christian God exists.