Atheists - was your family religious or atheist?

Question

Just curious whether most atheists are reacting against a religious upbringing or were never exposed to a religious faith.

Answer 1

I was very exposed. Thanks to my overly religious step-mother, who made me attend church twice a week and classes every weekend, I was actually able to learn about religion before making an educated choice to disagree with it.

Answer 2

All of my immediate Family are Atheists. I have a large extended Catholic Family some of who were Nuns and Priests in the past. Most of my older uncles and Aunties still go to Church but most of the family under Fifty are lapsed Catholics or Agnostic or Atheists.

Answer 3

Highly religious family.
I was also highly religious til I figured out that most of the faith was the equivilant to 2+2=22 and therefore could not keep believing in my family's faith while being able to maintain that I am an intelligent creature.

Answer 4

My mother, grandmother, stepmother, stepsister, and step-grandmother were all Catholic. I was raised Catholic and attended Catholic school until the age of 13.

I think it's funny how you only give two options. If an atheist was raised Christian, we are rebelling against our upbringing....but if we were not raised Christian, we are atheists because we were not exposed to a religious faith growing up. LOL...

Answer 5

Actually you will find that atheists come from both religious and non-religious families. There is no linear rule that determines why a person becomes atheist based on family background. Common sense is what you should be looking for.

Answer 6

My family is Christian, but I was never reacting against anything. I went through the motions for a long time (church, prayer, etc), until I realized that I was not fulfilled at all and admitted to myself that I didn't actually buy into any of it.

Answer 7

I am an atheist meaning I do not believe in god But I am religious , I am studying Buddhism , My family was Catholic I went to Catholic school taught by wonderful kind nuns , I just to not believe in a God who would condemn people for not being baptised

Answer 8

I am Agnostic...but people think that means I am Atheist..so I will answer

I was raised Catholic, my whole life, then when I was 15 I realized that my opinions, and what I believed were radically different than what I was raised to believe.
I saw all of the flaws in organized religion, and that none of them seemed that they were any more right than any other one, so I became Agnostic

Answer 9

wow, how many times can this question be asked?

*drink*

My mother is basically catholic, my father is non-denominational xian, my little sister believes in a supreme being, but other than that, she couldn't tell you...and my niece is too young to have a religion, or a belief on a god...


my atheism came about from my parents stressing that i question everything, and then when i questioned religion, they didn't have the answers i needed...

i went to college, and learned what i needed to learn...

Answer 10

About 50/50 and I am not reacting against the irrationality; I'm acting in favor of reason.