sent in by Hutch I've been visiting this website since September of 2004 and have been enjoying it ever since. It was in that September that I decided to read the KJV Bible all the way through, front to back, every word. Not long after I started reading the Bible I discovered this website. I was already not a xtian when I started reading the Bible. A lot of my friends were asking me why I visited this website since they thought I was never a xtian. They didn't know me when I lived in California. I'm now 42 and have lived in Seattle for 10 years. I was born to a "non-practicing" Catholic family. I attended church ocasionally for about 16 years. Some of my extended family members attended church regularly. My grandmother is still a devout Catholic and my mother went back to the faith when I dropped xtianity all together at 17. When I was about 8 or 9 some cousins and friends started going to a Baptist Sunday school and I went along. The first counple were

sent in by Hades Greetings all, I don't know if I posted my "testimony" here but here goes. I was born agnostic Hindu in Bombay and we migrated to Singapore in 1995. Here in 2001 I joined the Hope of God church as a charismatic christian. However very quickly points of friction arose. Being a science student and having always been brought up under the impression that all religions are equal, I found it very hard to digest the "I am right and you are wrong!" attitude the church had. I also was an evolutionary biology student in the university and that again created a lot of friction. Added to the fact that I didn't like "christian" (read: Fundy) music and was always willing to question inconsistencies in the bible, I decided that this was not the place for me. Leaving was hard because these people were very nice to me. The churchmembers were a friendly bunch and I didn't like to tell them that I had decided that they are full of shit as far

sent in by CurtDude [This was posted on the old forum as a response to someone else's post. I thought it was time to add my two cents to this forum, so here it is slightly expanded.] It was May 1984, and the Sunday morning service was just about ready to begin at the Baptist church in the Pacific NW where I had attended all of my life. I had been a John Denver-clone 70s Jesus Freak...I believed in the Gentle Shepherd and loving the world. Totally involved in being fired up for God. As the 80s and The Reagan Years rolled on, I was finding myself more at odds with my youthful idealism. I was also a young homosexual man who was realizing that there was only one choice for me as a follower of Jesus: a lifetime of celibacy while all of my friends got married. At the same time, my studies at university were giving me exposure to other people, other beliefs: I had begun to exercise my mind, my rational capacity. "Geez, there were other religions out there, along with n

sent in by Dave My problem is that my entire family and my wife's family are steeped in christianity and my wife is becoming more and more immersed every day. She and my three children are really involved with the church which is very active. I've been going to church fairly frequently to appease her, but I resent it more each time. We're in the middle of the bible belt and it would devastate my wife to tell her my beliefs or lack of them because she's sure that all that stuff is true, and I could sure use some advice on how to handle this situation. I'm sure someone out there has experienced this situation and maybe could help. I sure hope so. It's driving me crazy. State: NC Country: USA Became a Christian: 12 Ceased being a Christian: 40's Why I joined: fear Why I left: I started looking outside the box

sent in by Sarah I have been on a journey leaving Christianity for the last two years. It started when we joined a controlling charasmatic church four years ago. Before that we attended a Lutheran church that was pretty normal for the most part. I think if I would have stayed in the Lutheran church, I would still be a Christian today because for the most part Lutherans are pretty liberal and laid-back. But despite being in the Lutheran Church, things were not normal and peaceful in our lives:(my husband and I) we alway felt like we had to do MORE, get closer to God MORE, pray MORE, read our bibles MORE and then maybe then we would attain some character transformation or inner peace, but the real result, more guilt and more anxiety and fear..(And the whole guilt-ridden Christian culture that promotes waiting till marriage to have sex!!! I could go on for an hour about how damaging that is, but I won't. Most of you know already and the topic is rather strange to talk abou

sent in by Todd I have been in church most of my life. Been a believer most my life. I was baptist early on, then changed to Presbyterian in the last 11 years. I have never been comfortable in church. I am still involved, mostly because of my wife and family who are in church. They do not know I am a doubter. I first starting doubting things the more I learned about science and biology. I take Discover magazine. Its a good science one. It has had me doing some serious thinking. Then I read an article in newsweek magine on the birth of christ. After, I bought a book I am reading now, "Born Divine" by Robert Miller. He poses some serious questions like why is it that the virgin birth is only mentioned in Matthew and Luke. Its found no where else in the new testiment. If its such a miracle as the church has it to be, I think Paul must have wanted everyone to know about it, I think it would have been in Mark and John. Buts its not there. I am perplexed n

sent in by Wade My parents took me to church from a very young age. Too young for me to even remember when it started. My earliest memories include going to church, a southern Baptist church. Every adult in my life was telling me this was THE truth. I never even considered the fact it might not be…until over 30 years later. The concept of hell was introduced from the very beginning. When I was 4 or 5 they took all the boys in a small room and told us about the hellfire, pain and torment. They told us we had to say a prayer to accept Jesus or it would happen to us. They instructed us all to pray right then and there. After we were done they asked us one by one if we had said the prayer. One boy said he hadn’t. They took him in another room to talk “one on one” with him. That was the beginning of my fear based brainwashing that lasted my entire life. I was never the type to want to “fit in”. I was a xtian because it was the “right” thing to do. I spent my childhood pra

sent in by Titus My father is a Methodist preacher (55 years old), and, as objectively as possible, I think I'd have to say that he's one of the most forward-thinking preachers I know as he enjoys History and Psychology. In other words, as preachers and Christians in general go, he's very much in the minority. He's a chaplain at a state mental hospital and additionally he's done work at the local VA hospital, so he does a lot of work with people who are addicted to alcohol and drugs. He also passed the state exam in 1989 for a funeral director's license, so he does bereavement counseling and also makes a few bucks on the side transporting bodies from hospitals to the funeral home. All in all, I think he's a good man, but more on that in a bit. I turned 31 in December 2004, and I cannot recall a time when I did not go to church--or at least I always faced the prospect of going to church. As a child, I just took it in stride. Going

sent in by Nick I was baptised a catholic, I had no problem with that at the time, and don't really have one now. I was born the seventh of thirteen children, so I was a typical catholic. I went to a catholic school, went to church every Sunday, sat in the front row with all my siblings and eventually became an altar boy, a musician and very involved in extra curricular activities. School was o.k. During religion we learnt the usual things such as the story of creation, original sin and so forth. I was pretty pissed off about Adam eating that fruit and turning us all into sinners. In high school of course that changed, as catholic schools, where I live anyway, teach that the first 11 chapters of Genesis are not literal and the theory of evolution was accepted as to how we got to where we are now. We also learnt about other religions, as the vatican II documents state that there is good that we can take from every religion, something which the vatican I followers weren

sent in by Barry Hi ~ I did the christian religious thing on and off for about 4 decades of my life in my search for the truth of reality. I went through all of the usual christian symptomotology....guilt, fear, worry, anxiety, all of which was directly attributable to christian indoctrination. But I "believed" in Jesus all along, even if the teachings of church, ministers, pastors et al were bereft of any apparent understanding of Love or the true meanings of His words. So I stuck with it as best I could, but the best I could was never good enough, which circled right back to guilt, fear, worry, anxiety which are self-perpetuating indoctinal aspects of christianity. For me, the words echoing around the church from the pulpit never seemed to be filled with any loving understanding of christ or the christ message. The words were hollow. Empty of any knowledge, feeling, or understanding. I drifted off, but held my convictions about jesus, while turning my back on

sent in by CJ-R I never thought I'd be writing my story of how I became an Ex-Christian (protestant), but here I am. As far back as I can remember, my Mom attended the Baptist church (don't remember if it was a First or Southern Baptist) in the small Kansas town where we lived. I really didn't enjoy Vacation Bible School, I would have rather been home sleeping or watching TV. When I was 9 my Dad died suddenly. I was a Daddy's girl so I was crushed. I was very angry with God (think Bible-God) for at least 2 years. In that time my Mom started attending a small Non-Denominational Church in town, which was more like a social gathering than Church, but I enjoyed it. I don't remember learning anything about the Bible or God, but I had lots of fun. Then one day when I was about 13, an Assembly of God preacher, from another small town nearby, came to our door while Mom was gone & left some information about his church. Unfortunately, my Mom decided to chec

sent in by Travis I was born into a upper middle class, white, southern baptist family. I was required to attend church since birth, raised by very conservative parents, and went to a christian school. Life was going fairly well for me, I had my first real girlfriend who was the text book definition of a christian fundementalist, all of my friends were just as religious as her, I at the time was perhapse even a big more religious then them. My life revolved around the church and my religion, when I was 7 I tried very hard to read through the bible, and even though I could hardly understand any of what it was actually saying or knew what any of it meant I actually made through it front to back in about a month or so. The use of what seemed to me to be mystical words, not to mention that all my life I had heard how divine it was, it impressed me so incredibly much. From about 7 on I was determined to be a preacher, a missionary, to use what I thought was the ultimate weapon

sent in by Greg After more than 15 years struggling to be a fundamentalist Christian, I finally (and with much trepidation) made my break from Christianity about a month ago. After years of being in and out of church and struggling to believe the hopelessly illogical dogma of mainstream fundamentalism, the loss of my faith hit me suddenly, like a bolt out of the blue. I've been reading the response letters from Christians, and it seems they have many misconceptions about us "apostates". For instance, many of them believe that it was the people that drove us away from the faith, that somehow the church let us down, and we're just leaving out of spite or resentment. For some that may be the case. But for me (and I'd wager most of us), the people were, by and large, very loving and sincere, if a bit closed-minded. For most of us, our faith was far too precious to be abandoned on the basis of politics or disagreements. For most of us, the battle was entir

sent in by Andy Kimber Hello folks. My name’s Andy, and I’m from the UK. My story’s slightly different from most of the ones I’ve read here, where the Christian behaviour was drummed in at an early age. Although I was christened in the Anglican church as an infant, my parents never went to church when I was growing up (except for the Midnight Mass carol service on Christmas Eve, which I thoroughly enjoyed – and I still love Christmas carols :o) ). My mother taught me to “say my prayers” at bedtime but that was it. My conversion experience came at the age of 15 through an organisation called “Youth for Christ”. A couple of evangelists came to school one lunchtime and played some amusing songs. They gave some interesting facts about the world and the universe and encouraged us to go along to their meeting the next night at a local Baptist church. Well, I wouldn’t normally have gone, but a friend who was in the school Christian Union persuaded me, so off I went. They played some