I'm still the same loving person

----- I first want to say that I enjoy this site very much. I was raised very much like allot of you here. My Family has deep Christian roots. I myself was once very devoted to my walk. But I had my back slider moments as other Christians would say, and at those times, I would feel "Oh my God! I’m going to hell because of all those things we're told that will get us put there" -- being human, not having enough faith and so forth.

All my life I’ve had questions inside. A lot of those questions could not be answered from the Bible, but still I defended the Word. Or I'd watch the infamous TBN when I felt my faith was lacking. The thing was, I didn’t feel any better about certain situations afterward.

I married my high school sweetheart, was willing to just stay back and be a housewife and raise our daughter . For 7 yrs. straight, I went through living with relatives many yrs. His job hopping and then a drug problem took every thing. All those yrs. I prayed and cried. Nothing ever got better, but at the time I thought he was the love of my life.

When I was 24 I moved to Arizona. Shortly after living there I got into a party mode and a year later I really felt bad for what I did. I asked for forgiveness but for 5 yrs still felt just as bad. I got back in the mode thinking I didn’t have enough faith, It started another unhealthy cycle.

Now to the recent part of my life. 11 months ago my questions got the best of me and I began to read outside of the Bible about human origins. I found out that all humans had their own understanding of creation. Then I read a book called God vs. the Gods. It really helped. I’ve done a lot of researching and I enjoy everything I’ve read.

I got married 6 months ago and my family was fine with him, but now they think he's the reason I lost my faith. The day before Easter my daughter made a comment that not everybody believes in Jesus, and it caused my family a lot of buzzing. My husband felt he should clarify his beliefs with my mom. At the time, I still was doing my own searching.

I wrote my mom a letter trying to help her understand, but it didn’t help much. The Virginia tech thing set her off, and she called me and said those kind of things happen because people aren’t living under God's protection and our country is in trouble and blah ,blah ,blah. I’ve grown out of the perceptions I once had. I’ve learned of early church history, and am still learning. My family is worried I’m going to hell. My aunt even called my dad the other night and told him "before your daughter gets here you should know that she’s not following the faith anymore" and blamed my husband again. They can't see that I'm smart enough to figure shit out for myself. My dad never married my mom. His family was somewhat Christian, although he respects other people's viewpoints. When he told me that she called him, I really got pissed. It was not her place to tell him anything especially because she’s not his sister. My Mom also did the same telling my grandparents. It Should of been me, when I was ready.

Really enjoyed the article; “Not ready to make nice“. I don’t think everyone decides in one day to go against the way they were taught. It takes awhile to shake off the shackles of Christianity. I don’t believe the dogma of the Bible, I don’t believe in hell. And as hard as it for Christians to believe our country was not founded by the dogma either. We all have the right to believe what we chose to or not. I am glad I found this site.

Now the cat is out of the bag, it nice to see other related stories and to be comforted to know I’m not alone. I don’t feel guilty for leaving the faith and the research has helped back it up. I do get mad because my family don’t see that I’m still the same loving person.

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