The Realization That Shattered My Faith

Many religions have special features which make them spread. But they made me stop believing.

Discovering that religions evolve through a darwinian process made me question my faith. Religions are memeplexes shaped over long periods of time, and my Christianity was no different. Here’s a story from my deconstruction story which I haven’t discussed before. Regardless of whether you’re ex-Christian, atheist, or otherwise, understanding memetics is hugely valuable.

I recommend Richard Dawkins’ The Selfish Gene and Susan Blackmore’s The Meme Machine to learn more about memes.

-------------------------------------------SUPPORT-------------------------------------------

Non-sectarian Biblical Studies Courses by Dr. Bart Ehrman (affiliate link):

-------------------------------------------FOLLOW-------------------------------------------

-------------------------Resources for atheists in need-------------------------

This video contains 100% therapeutic grade skepticism.*

*This statement has not been evaluated by the FDA

[VoidDragon]

My mum is a Hindu, she does her 5-10 mins of prayers in the morning; then swears like a drunken sailor the rest of the day 😂. We had holy books of many faiths on the book shelves, right along side science books, poetry and other literary works. She said to me when I was 10, “whether you believe in faith, any faith, doesn’t matter. What does matter is keeping your true heart; always strive to be honest, compassionate and kind. Never be naive, keep a critical mind but don’t become jaded by people’s darkness”. 30 year on and I still remember her words.

[nunyabiznazz]

When I was eight, I figured out Santa wasn't real. It was quite disturbing at the time, mostly because I then began to question the existence of God. No matter how hard I tried I couldn't stop thinking, "What if God is just Santa for grownups?" It was at this point I became a non-believer, although I wouldn't admit it, even to myself, until much later. In retrospect the ability to think critically, even about my cherished beliefs, was the best Christmas gift "Santa" ever gave me.

[InvasionAnimation]

They were magic oils. They did the impossible. They turned a Christian into an athiest!

[AdmiralBison]

"Christianity started out in Palestine as a fellowship; it moved to Greece and became a philosophy;
it moved to Italy and became an institution; it moved to Europe and became a culture;
it came to America and became an enterprise."
~Sam Pascoe

[outermarker]

Interesting MLM/Christianity parallels:
"You just didn't work hard enough" and "You just didn't have enough faith"
"You just wanted it all easy" and "You just wanted to sin"
"You never committed to it" and "You were never really saved"
Flabbergasted at myself for ever having been christian as well as supportive of a close family member in an MLM despite my misgivings. I just let faith cover the multitude of warning signs in both.

[a.a.]

You're amazing
I'm an ex Muslim
Now I'm agnostic
I remember the pain and stupidity I felt when my faith shattered, but now I have found peace and I'll never look back again

[DrumWild]

I was not put through childhood indoctration, so I was never a believer. Deconstruction stories are fascinating to me. It sounds like a difficult yet necessary path.

[erkziltonz]

I was kicked out of Religious Education class as a kid for asking the wrong kind of questions. I guess it was easier to remove me and my 'bad influence' on the others than say "i dont know".

[BCole-bjlv]

Drew, you nailed it. After I had left Christianity I did a thought experiment. I tried to make up a religion with the following goals: needs to appeal to the majority, needs to pull at the emotions, should be exclusive and cause people to follow it, should prevent people from leaving, should include powerful methods of transmittal and reasons to do so. As I thought the process through I kept thinking of unique Bible verses that are doing exactly that. They are the little verses with the enormous impact. I could picture men sitting around coming up with these verses just as I was. The Koran takes it even further, the founders must have looked at Judaism and Christianity and asked themselves: "How can we create even more severe followers that are more dedicated and more intense?" Well, that all is obvious now; you can't question Mohammad, he is perfect and the Koran is perfect. You must pray 5 times a day (none of this weekly stuff - 5x a day). You are to be killed if your leave the religion. Convert everyone to Islam, and so on. Pilgrimages, rituals, impressive buildings, and the absolute indoctrination of one's children. The verses are there. It's exactly what one would put in a book if you wanted to win the battle of religion for the world. It there really were an all powerful god, all this strife and religious intolerance, inside each religion, would be unnecessary. Religions wouldn't be. Clearly an all powerful god would have a better thing going. The mind of men are behind every single religious text.

[Blurby-Sir]

As a child, I slowly connected the dots and no matter how much I tried, I couldn't keep my faith. I cried to my pastor during communion class and he was surprisingly chill about it. Good Dude.

[BlackfootFerret]

Questioning your own faith is one of the most frightening things a person can do. Thanks for sharing your story and letting us know we’re not alone.

[andrewbenge]

My real "moment, " which had slowly been building up over time, was listening to Aurelio Voltaire's "Dead" in which he describes a plane crash in which an atheist survived. There's a line about praying for help"god is all knowing and God is all seeing, just who do think that you are to change his mind? He already knows what you want and decided that you didn't need it, so don't bother asking for cures or an answer" and it really struck me. I'd really read the Bible growing up, much more than most, and I just couldn't square the circle.

[geliluna]

The moment my faith started to crack was when a new priest was assigned to my block, he was rude and he made everyone felt guilty by constantly shaming one member or another for any reason. The nail in the coffin was one my aunt came to church with us one day and she recognized the priest as the former priest at her colony. She told us he was "expelled" for accusations of child a**se. I was probably 14.

[Eudaletism]

Imagine that you told a child that Santa only brings presents if you _believe_ in him, and they'll get hurt if they stop. The moment they start doubting, they'd become scared of their own thoughts and try to believe even harder. Attaching rewards and punishments to _beliefs_ does damage to the process of epistemic reasoning.

[chdna]

My husband just gave you a standing ovation! He was so happy with the way you described this! Thank you for putting into words what was difficult for him to say.

[jamminhd]

I’m a Christian going into ministry. I appreciate your stories because it does show light into what others have gone through. My professor used to say “if you never doubted then you never thought.” Thank you for sharing your insights 😊

[TheDJdragonflame]

When my grandmother was buried just after I deconverted I nearly exploded at the service. Why? Because the way the preacher presented the reunion in heaven made me realize that heaven and the reunion with loved ones is emotional blackmail designed to keep believers attached to the doctrine and the fact that my dead grandmother was being used that way was hard to stomach

[stacyrosa]

My parents left the Lutheran Church when I was a small child. My mom had had a "nervous breakdown " and was in the hospital. The only thing that came from the church, was a reminder that my folks had not paid their tythings for the month. I will always be grateful for that "oversight" because I learned very early in life to question any organization that requires payment in exchange for what should always be given freely...kindness and compassion. I am not an atheist, but my relationship with what I believe is divine, is a very private and personal one. Organized religion is just an ancient power structure used to control the masses with false promises and fear. I'm glad my folks were always open about why we left.

[anongirlfrompoland]

In my country (Poland) there's this non-mandatory "religion" class in schools (they are, of course, only about the Christian religion). When I went to elementary school, during one of these classes, a boy asked the teacher - "How can we be sure that the Christian god is the real one, and not some other god?"
The teacher replied without thinking, "Because the Christian god was the first one."
The Christian god.
The first one.
Even my 10-year-old brain knew something was wrong there.

[nunyabiznazz]

I worked in direct marketing when I was in Hawaii. The company I worked for was, indeed, cult like. We would have mandatory meetings in the morning for 2 hours before we went to work, we also had meetings after work for 2 hours so we ended up having 12 hour days. After you had been there awhile Saturdays became mandatory as well. You could even go "night pitching' where you would take stuff into the bars and sell it to the patrons. You were allowed to drink tho', so it didn't always seem like "work" but I digress. After awhile you became dependent on the company for everything. You would be living in a apartment or house owned or rented by the company, drive a company car, etc. This made it really hard to get out, especially since you usually barely made enough to survive, and wouldn't have enough without company help. I ended up having to call my folks for a ticket off the island. I did indeed have some good times but the feeling of "being trapped" I don't want to ever feel again. Didn't help that I was on an Island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, Hawaii is beautiful and I hope to go back and visit someday but I found out the hard way that "paradise" can turn into prison.