By Mriana Image via Soulfountain (Names have been changed/withheld to protect the living) In 1973 I was seven and riding back home with my parents after spending a long summer with my grandparents. I don’t remember much before then, except bits and pieces, but after that was living hell, which I have no knowledge as to why. The thing is, as a child, none of it was my fault, but rather the adults in my life and it had nothing to do with a god. It was all on the humans. My parents did not go to church, unless we were with my mother’s relatives, even after all the times my mother and I left the abuser. Yet the bizarreness of Evangelicalism , along with insanity plagued my childhood. Being of short parents, I was small enough to lie down in the back seat of a Vega to watch the blue sky pass by overhead. As I watched, I thought, “We’ve been to the moon and back, but neither God nor heaven is there.” Thus began a long journey of learning that the god of the adults was not my god, for m...

By Christian B Hello, I have been with this website a long time now and I feel now is the time to introduce myself and my beliefs. My Name is Christian, I am from the United Kingdom and I am 27 years old. I am a Unitarian along with what I would consider my own 'unique' beliefs, and I believe that this is my 'path' in this lifetime. Why do so many of us, including me, start off as Christians, then suddenly or over a course of many years find ourselves outgrowing it? Well, I believe that these events are 'predestined' and are part of our soul's development. Each of us is a individual soul with individual gifts, talents and needs. I personally believe in ' reincarnation ' and that most of us here where Christians because of who we may have been in a ' past life ' for many numerous reasons and in what I believe to be the spiritual realms, Our soul, or 'higher self' along with our 'guardian angels' and 'guides' chose ...

Image via Wikipedia By Christian I was a Non-Denominational Christian girl and as I got older, I was very involved in my church. I went out witnessing (trying to proselytize people and inviting people to my church) on Saturday mornings and I was thoroughly brainwashed by my church to think that all non-Christians would be in hell. I constantly attended altar calls to rededicate my life to god and to make sure that I would go to heaven. Well, this lasted until I went to college and was exposed to new ideas. I eventually knew that my beliefs were going to change and I started reading Carl Sagan . I started learning more about my first love which was science and how it actually worked. I was exposed to a world that was more wonderful than anything I experienced. I read other science publications--books, magazines, anything I could get my hands on--and digested the information. I eventually discovered the joy of reading Skeptical Inquirer ; I decided to strengthen my natural skepticism. I ...

Image by visual.dichotomy via Flickr By Neal Stone Funny how things work out sometimes. As I was getting ready to write this part I found my office (a local non-profit) was losing funding and we have to cut expenses. It was a three day weekend and I fell into a deep depression. Much better now though. But what is funny is that the depression I felt I haven't felt in years. It was a deep rooted, not sure what to do type depression. The last time I felt this ways was when I was in church and not sure what to do with my life. I spent my whole church life this way. Of course now I am all sorted out and feeling better. Just got a shock at first when I got the news though it was expected. This is why the week delay in this posting. After becoming a Christian and my parents “got right with God”, they decided I needed to leave public school and go to a private Christian school. I spent the 6th grade being picked on by bullies, falling behind on my work and piratically failing. ...

Image by Getty Images via Daylife Sent in by SFT I took a deep breath, walked a short distance, turned around and realized my reality had fallen to bits... I've been frequenting this site quite a lot lately, amazed and relieved that there are others out there. And reading some of your testimonies I realize that most if not all of you were "true" Christians, although I've found most Christians deny this fact and say otherwise. I think right now I'm stuck in a transitioning process, still open minded to both sides. There are still books to be read and thoughts to examine. However, I'm tired of trying to shove mashed potatoes through a small pin hole -- it's frustrating and brings great fatigue and confusion. I realize all that I have based my belief on is unfounded and shows my great ignorance. I grew up in a Christian home my whole life. I've attended a Baptist church ever since I was a small child. I even went to a Christian high-school . I w...

Image by Bedtime Champ via Flickr Sent in by Al My Christian journey to hell began when I was 12 years old. Actually, it started when I was six or seven, when my mom made me attend Catholic Classes (CCD), but that's another story. When I was 12, I had the misfortune of seeing the movie "The Late Great Planet Earth ," by Hal Lindsay . Actually he didn't write it himself, he co-wrote it with some crazy woman. But anyway, before then I really didn't know a lot about the Bible. It was quite an introduction. When I was a child I thought that God and Jesus were just powers that wanted me to be a decent person. In the Catholic tradition they make you feel like God is a big mystery that only the priesthood can understand, and that God is only good. If you do something "bad" then you have to feel a lot of guilt. This was well ingrained in me. When I saw the movie, my eyes were opened to what the "Biblical" God is really all about. I remember watchi...

Image via Wikipedia Sent in by Ryn Darknight I am going to be honest. This is very difficult for me to write as I am a very private person and I want to protect my family--all of whom are Xians. Several years ago I thought I would undertake a study of evolution to determine if it is true. I began to realize from my studies that it is true and that if modern humans are at the very least 50,000 years old then the Adam and Eve story must be false. I continued my studies and found evidence for disease existing in the world before humans ever got here and that completely undermined for me the story of the ' fall ' of humankind. I felt a great sense of relief because I had always been troubled by what I thought to be true--that God had cursed the world because of the sin of Adam and Eve. It makes me angry with myself that I ever believed this. I had read the Bible through a number of times, and I always had a sense of disparity in my mind over the 'God of love' as portr...

Image by Getty Images via Daylife Sent in by Darrin From birth I was raised in the Pentecostal faith by my mother, and I never really had any doubts about the existence of "God" or the claims of the bible until my mid to late teens. I just assumed that if your mother and your family tell you something is real it must be true, because they wouldn't steer you in the wrong direction, right? My mother divorced her second husband (great guy) when I was 15 and we moved back to the home that we had lived in before they were married. They agreed that my stepfather would make the house payment and provide her with a late model car of her choice. He was actually the most honest used car dealer you would ever want to meet. Now, back to the story. After we were in the house for a while, at some point, my mother developed a compulsive disorder with the thermostat and the lighting in the house. She would constantly check and lower the thermostat and spent most of her time watching te...

Image by Darwin Bell via Flickr Sent in by Chris S The process of de-conversion from Christianity for me as many of you may relate, was actually a very slow one. By slow, I mean roughly 15 years or so. I think that it may have happened sooner, but in hind-sight rationalized away or chose to ignore the things that were troubling me so. For years the thought of being labeled a “heretic” or “apostate”, brought guilt and quite frankly was afraid of hell. This site has really really helped me and am thankful for it! One of it's interesting distinctions is that we once were Christians. We had hopes, we had dreams, we loved Jesus, we walked the talk, we were “on-fire” at one time and know what that means. This site has helped me realize that I am not the only one facing de-conversion from a destructive religion, which even though may not be aware of it, enslaves minds and suppresses freedom to live happily without guilt and accusation. I got “saved” at 16 in the Baptist ch...

Image by joaquimb via Flickr Sent in by exrelayman I guess it is time for my testimony. I have commented here a few times. Here is a complete post. This testimony is about how belief became unbelief. It will not be cluttered with elements of my life story or feelings (Life Story: concerto for mouth and tear ducts). It is, as best I can recall from a 40-some-year-old memory, in sequence. 1) Reading the Bible: The very first chink in my belief was the supposed cry of Jesus on the cross, "Why have you forsaken me?" I did not immediately become an atheist, but the concept that Jesus, being divine, could either be abandoned or feel abandoned in this vital moment was troubling. The next chink for me was the abrupt change in the Jews. How could the triumphant entry into Jerusalem, accompanied by hosannas and adoration, so quickly become (I paraphrase), "Crucify him, let his blood be upon us?" A subset of this problem was why did his enemies need Judas to identify him when...

By Bruce I am often questioned as to why I retired from the pastoral ministry. I started preaching as a teenage boy and I pastored my first Church at age 24. Since then I have pastored Churches in Ohio , Texas and Michigan with my last pastorate being in 2003. I have been married over 30 years and I have spent my entire married life in the ministry. Acquaintances, family and friends are often miffed as to why I just walked away from the ministry. Why retire, I am often asked. Surely there’s a Church somewhere for you to pastor ? Surely you still “want” to pastor? If God called you how can you walk away from his calling? Good questions and quite frankly I have more questions these days than I do answers. What follows is an attempt by me to shed some light on the “why” question. Why did I retire from the ministry? I retired because the word retire is a better word than quit . I don’t want to be known as a quitter. I was told my whole life by my peers that God hates quitters. I ...

Image by Ekler via Flickr By Neal Stone By the time I started school it was evident I had a learning disability . My ability to just speak and say what was on my mind was a major challenge. Still fighting this a little to this day but much better than it was long ago. I would be enrolled in school and would always need special attention. Not all the teachers were thrilled with that. When I was in the third grade the teacher hated me. She made me stay in on my breaks and lunches and do more school work, mostly math. To top it off she failed me and I had to retake third grade. I would develop mental learning blocks because of this, especially in math. This doesn't make sense as if I decided I hated someone I would want to get rid of them, not spend another whole year with them! Years later my mom would run into this teacher at the store and told her how well I was doing and that I graduated from high school which was one of the things they figured I would never do. This tea...