Atheists who were once Christian - Why did you turn away from Christianity?

Question

Can you truly say your life is any better?

Answer 1

Because the church of Atheists has more flexible hours of worship, the priests are not all wino kiddie fiddlers and people just go about their business without trying to convert others. Oh and atheists aren't hypocritical

Answer 2

It was the years of being lied to, stolen from, and put down by the very Christians that claimed to be so good that finally made me stop believing in it all. The fact that God has never shown up to invite me back for tea and cookies kind of solidifies the idea that there IS no God anyway.

And yes, my life is INFINITELY better without the shackles of religion dictating what I think and do. I am truly free.

Answer 3

I was raised by Christians in a Christian home and called myself a Christian, but I never actually bought into any of it. I thought it was fairy tales, and then I figured out that other people actually believed it! After a lot of growing up and learning, I realized that it was ok to call myself an atheist because I had always been one. The concept of god/s makes no rational sense to me, and even as a child it didn't "feel right."

Yes, my life is much better now that I know longer pretend to believe something I don't.

Answer 4

I can truly say my life is much better. Nearly every religion posits some sort of hidden, immaterial realm which exists behind the visible, physical, and material realm in which we live. Often we are supposed to be partaking in this immaterial realm because who we "really" are is defined by an immaterial, immortal soul. This immaterial realm is also treated as being higher and more important than the material one because it's the realm in which gods live and which we are destined to inhabit after our physical bodies die.

However important these beliefs may be to religious theists, there isn't any solid, verifiable evidence that even suggests any of it is true. On the contrary, everything we do know and everything we continue learn points to the conclusion that all of those claims are completely false, and instead that the following are true: life is material and natural, we don't have anything like an immaterial or immoral soul, and an immaterial, disembodied "mind" like gods are supposed to have just isn't possible.

When all available evidence points away from a particular position, that doesn't necessarily mean that it's false, but it is unreasonable to believe it.
The evidence against the claim that our minds are really immaterial and not a product of our physical brains is unequivocal. When a person's brain is stimulated, through physical implements, drugs, or magnetic fields, and put in a particular physical state, then a person's mental experience corresponds to what we know about that state. Approaching from the other direction, self-reports about particular mental experiences correspond to evidence about their brains' particular physical states. There is no reason for this to be true if our minds and mental experiences are independent of our brains; people who continue to insist otherwise offer no means for testing and verifying that claim.

Answer 5

I certainly can. I am an atheist, I do not believe in any gods, yet I do have religion. 2, in fact. I turned away from Christianity because I never believed it, even as a child.

*The following is a representation of my own opinion, which is mine and I do not expect any of you to share it. If you disagree, I still respect you*

God created the laws of physics? then sent his son to come break them.

God regards all men and women as equal? But only if they believe. That's not equal, fool

Incest is evil, which means God himself promotes evil, by creating Adam and Eve. They are made from the same flesh, which makes any sexual activity between them evil. If they have any children, it's once again gonna become incest. Doesn't work out.

Jesus apparently promoted love for all, yet he himself refused to respect Satan?

There's just way too many inconsistencies and embellishments in both the bible and church sermons for me to take it seriously. I have enough religion to actually respect Christians, though. They are people, just like me, therefore I am no better than them. In my opinion, I truly respect and love all of mankind, nature, and the supernatural. I try to embrace all.

Answer 6

Well BillyBonzoBones, that's a pretty strong set of answers isn't it?

And so many of them feel better, as do I.

As a teenager I was dithering about religion to believe or not to believe and then I heard, at school, a series of school radio broadcasts about religion.

They were meant, I am sure, to reinforce Christianity but to me the only speaker who made any sense was a humanist. I have long forgotten his name but he lifted a huge burden off me and for that I will always be thankful.

All religion BillyBonzo, is bad because religion, at its heart, denies reason.

Reason has given all the things that lift us above superstition and quackery. Religion does its best to drag us back.

If I were not an atheist my motto would be 'God save us from religion'

Answer 7

Out of necessity, if I was going to stay honest.
My study of the bible, and its history, and the history of the Christian church and its doctrines, and comparing those with the world I saw... raised doubts at least, and prayer, even with fasting and tears, (and I'm not kidding) did not resolve them. It was a slow and reluctant conclusion that atheism makes more sense, is much more likely to represent the true view of the world. But it's what I was effectively driven to by thought and research.

And is it better? Well I wasn't prepared to lie to myself, even for a happy illusion.
And "truth is better than much profit" as Thomas Huxley had it, even if it does cost apparent consolation.

Oh dear, redtoes226-
"if they did leave then they werent really born again "

That's the standard defence. It may be convincing for those on the inside (I even used it, then!) but for those who know we were genuine Christians before, it doesn't wash.

Answer 8

well billybonzobones, I have not looked at any of the other answers, so forgive me if your getting a repeat.

Its a bit like a JFK's speech, it was always " don't ask God what he can do for you, ask yourself what can you do for God".

Thing was, I was brought up in the belief and became an active member of the church, I became a Sunday school teacher, and I realised that I hadn't got a clue what it was all about. I questioned my belief, because I did things for God, but never saw anything in return. I remember the church I attended being ripped apart by scandals, maybe not scandalous enough to hit the newspapers, but...! I saw Muslim extremists fly two planes into the twin towers, and I thought 'What God would let that happen?'

What God would let his "children" fight between themselves so much, without lifting a finger?

I'm a father now, and when my children misbehave, I have to do something about it. I don't sit back and let them beat hell out of each other.

Christians will say that God gave us free will, but seriously, this is taken from the Old testament. Its just a book full of stories - easy to understand gibberish for an ancient civilisation to give them laws and an understanding of a world they lived in, which encompassed Middle Eastern regions and no further.

Everyone is free to believe what they like, and I won't knock you if your Christian, Muslim, Buddhist etc. its just that I don't believe in any omnipotent God(s), and I won't try to convert you. My kids go to Church, they like it. They go with their Grandparents. Faith is a journey, one that I don't want my kids to miss out on, but its a case of knowing when to get off, if indeed you ever do.

My life is no better or worse, but at least I am judged by my peers in life and I don't have any worries about being judged in death.

Answer 9

a great variety of the atheists right here on R&S seem to lose their faith as a results of fact of straightforward scientific incongruity with Biblical writings. knowledgeable people recognize that the Earth is approximately 4.5 billion years previous and that it took countless billion years to variety. that's patently inconsistent with the thought God created the Earth and the universe in an insignificant seven days. Apologists who argue that a 'day' in God's attitude isn't unavoidably the comparable length as an afternoon in human attitude are seemed to be copping out--and that i think of they are. From the evaluations I even have considered expressed, atheists get very wrapped up interior the scientific inconsistencies between technology and the Bible and don't get into the deeper essence of religion, that's the easy experience of affection and onenes with the universe. they think of that faith is damaging and unsafe--and, in many situations, they are definitely top. yet they do no longer make the leap forward into seeing how deeply beautiful faith would be. in case you strip away each and all the guy-made trappings of religion and easily immerse your self interior the middle of it, that's love, you will locate faith, and you will understand that God isn't what the clergy could make it. basically my opinion, besides. :)

Answer 10

Was brought up a Catholic and found it very difficult to conform to a religion that is so set in stone and conservative. Recently read the God Delusion by Dawkins - made alot of sense but still think deep down I am agnostic and not truly atheist. Not being Catholic anymore has made me feel free.

Answer 11

When I was a child, I spake as a child,
I understood as a child, I thought as a child:
but when I became a man, I put away
childish things.

First Epistle of Paul to the Corinthians
Bible, 1 Corinthians 13, verse 11