Never fully got it

sent in by Felicia

I’m not sure when I really became a “Christian”. My mother was/is, but my father believe “God” is within himself. He thinks church and religion is bullshit. When I was young my mother made me go to church with her, not every Sunday or anything, but at least every Easter, and major holidays or events.

Anyhow, I so called found “the Lord” for myself when I was about 22. I was depressed and in a situation I felt I could not make it out of. I met a man at the mall one day, where I was applying for jobs and he bought me a bible. (He was a preacher at a local church). So I began reading it, not truly understanding what I was reading, but I thought I really wanted to give this Christianity thing a shot. My father thought I was nuts, but I wanted to believe.

I then began to devote my life, (as much as I could anyways) to God. This lasted this way until I was about 26, by then I had been suffering from an eating disorder, more depression, was married, had another child, ( I already had two) and was really enthralled in the whole Christian way of life. I began to dress in long skirts, shun secular music, only watched the Christian shows on T.V., enrolled my kids in a Christian private school, stopped letting them participate in Halloween, became a vegan, wore a cross, had crosses all around my house. Went to every church service imaginable, gave so much money I stayed broke most of the time, because the preacher said to, if you didn’t God would know you were holding back from his kingdom and you would not be blessed. And I badly needed a blessing.

At the time my husband ( who believes in God and respects religion, but does not go to church and participate in the ritualistic bullshit) and I were trying to have another baby, and for some reason it just wasn’t happening. We’d never had a problem before, so I couldn’t understand.

Finally, after almost a year I got pregnant, had just started a great job at the bank, and things were going great, until one day at work, during training, my stomach began cramping badly. I went into the restroom, to discover I was bleeding, and miscarried right there in the toilet, on my new job during training.
Needless to say I was devastated. I left work early, cried and pleaded with God, why?
It turns out, just about everyone around me was pregnant at the time, except me. It was so painful to watch everyone elses stomachs growing and feeling like God didn't feel I was worthy of being a new mother just once more. I couldn’t understand why God would do this to us. Then the next blow, I got fired from my job. I began missing a couple of days here and there due to major depression, brought on in part I believe because I was desperately trying not to blame God, or complain because I knew God loved me, right?

Then of course I had to keep hearing from my mother in law, who is as saved as Tammy Fae Baker, every other Christians response for God’s fuck ups, is, "He’ll never put more on you than you can bear", that's when I began to doubt.

I still tried to remain Christian after this, but it was very difficult, I think that situation began to take my blinders off. None of it really made much sense to me, but I tried my best to swallow the excuses my fellow Christians were giving me when I had questions. After about a year of this, my faith was completely destroyed. I just couldn’t make myself believe the bull anymore. I got tired of the bad shit happening and someone pointing me in the direction of the story of Job. That is a sick as story if you ask me. God lets his whole family die just to show the devil how devoted Job is to him? Talk about sadistic. All loving god my ass.

I finally accepted the fact that my father was always right. It is all bullshit, and that people use religion to hide from themselves and their problems. They don’t go to church and cry like that because the “spirit” is moving them, they are crying because they are sitting there thinking about all their problems, and wallowing in self pity , all the while waiting on some God who sits on high to rescue them with so-called blessings, that he dulls out when he feels like it, and only when you pay enough offering, and tithes. Falling out not because the holy ghost jumped in them, but because they were in some sort of hypnotised stuper.

Since I have let that shit go, I feel so free it’s unbelievable. Knowing that I control my own destiny, not some fickle God character who has the most massive PMS mood swings I have ever seen in my life.

City: Newport News
State: Virginia
Country: USA
Became a Christian: about 22
Ceased being a Christian: 28
Labels before: I attended full gospel church of god in christ
Labels now: anti religion
Why I joined: At the time I thought God could really save me and make my life better
Why I left: Because it all just kept seeming like more and more bullshit
Email Address: momeefay at aol dot com