By No Longer Afraid ~ Image by exfordy via Flickr I was raised in Kansas City, MO by my Charismatic Christian parents. I got "saved" when I was five years old, as do most children born into a Christian home. My mother homeschooled my seven siblings, and I and most of our friends were those from our church, raised in the same way as I. We attended a non-denominational Christian church in Kansas City in which we practiced extreme Christianity. Worship services were more like raves, with people dancing in the aisles and speaking in tongues, having what seemed to be seizures on the floor. The documentary "Jesus Camp" reminds me of our sermons. We were "warriors for Christ." The church also sent some of it's members on mission trips, primarily in Mexico. I submitted to all of this. My life goal at that time was to get married, have kids and serve the Lord. I was a typical teenage "Jesus Freak." When I was 14, the church announced that...

By Kenneth S. (via Carl S.) Image by sarowen via Flickr I was raised in a Catholic family, and went to a Catholic school for almost eight years. In my last year I had an older nun, Sister Raymond, around 65 years-old, who did not like me because I used to ask her things that she could not explain. At the time I was following the crowd and dressed and acted the way I thought was popular (wrong). The nuns used to pull my hair and punish me because I had a DA (duck’s ass) haircut and wore pegged pants. I told my mother, “I have to get out of that school,” but she said, “You have to go to Catholic school.” Anyway, the next week, I was wrestling with a friend outside the church’s side door, and I pushed his head through it (stained glass). Guess who was right inside? Sister Raymond! The next week I was in public school. WOW! All the girls had breasts and nice legs, and were friendly. I didn’t know that life could be so free, where I could think and act as I pleased without sinning....

By Sylvester Image by knowhimonline via Flickr I converted to Christianity when I was 17, without knowing much about the bible and the religion. I began attending church regularly when I was 18 and soon was all "on fire" for Jesus. I "served" all I could, spent all my time in church and soon was promoted to become an "area" leader, in charge of about a 100 youths. I began to doubt when I was 22, after 4 years in church. I questioned the rules ands regulations of my ex-church. Rules like prohibiting girls to wear "tight" fitting clothes, prohibiting colouring of hair, and compulsory attendance for service and cellgroup. Of course after a while, I brushed it aside. I prayed and thought that god would take those doubts away. A year ago, my doubts were still not going away. In fact, things became worse. I began reading the bible thoroughly, hoping to find an answer for my doubts. But the more I read the bible, the more I was appalled at ...

By BillRPJ I fell in love with Jesus when I was 12 years old. On the back wall of the baptistery of the Chemung Baptist Church, there was a life-size picture of Jesus as a shepherd, a crook in one hand, cradling a soft, little lamb in the other. As I looked at the face of Jesus, I felt that his eyes were gazing right into my soul — kind eyes, eyes of love. I can recall the picture of Jesus like it was yesterday. When I turned 12, my father decided that I needed religion so I was sent off to Vacation Bible School in the summer of ’72. I was enraptured by the story of how he came to earth as a baby born of a virgin, did miracles to prove that he was God, died for my sins so that I could be forgiven, and rose again to make a way so that I could go to live with him in heaven forevermore. The VBS teacher said that all I needed to do in order to go to heaven someday was to tell Jesus that I was a sinner, that I was sorry for my sins, and ask him to come into my heart to live. Of course, ...

By 0pen ur Mind Image by Toni Travels via Flickr I grew up in a Christian home, loving, never to question authority, always bring it to God and you will be blessed. If I wasn’t, well... God was testing me. Growing up it never crossed my mind that there was something else to believe in. I was the good girl who had the truth on her lips. God is good, how can he not be? Not until college did I expand my mind and fully open it. It’s a brief overpass of my history, but a lot of you know exactly how my “upbringing” went. It wasn’t until I met my future husband that everything finally made sense. Back up to my high school years... I went to church, gave my life to Jesus Christ, gave 10%, hung out with Christians, but also wasn’t afraid to have secular friends either. Although I still felt that I was right and they were wrong for drinking beer. Towards my college years, I became more liberal. I got a few tattoos, had boyfriends but was still a virgin because I promised God I would painfu...

By J Image by asparagus_hunter via Flickr My ex-relationship with Christianity is perhaps unique, in that my family attended an Evangelical church, but one whose pastor was nonetheless pretty progressive or diplomatic in his views. (i.e. he rarely mentioned hell, End Times, or even sin in his sermons. It was just "love" and "the Good News.") But the Sunday School classes (6th grade specifically) were taught by less diplomatic people. They were volunteers which basically meant two things: they obviously were passionate about what they were doing to do it for free, and they had no worries about money or church attendance, so they didn't need to be uplifting or popular in what they said. So as my parents listened in the main church building about how God is love and sin is forgiven and nicety after sugar-coated nicety (as, I've come to learn since, this is pretty much their entire view of Christianity... they are not fundamentalists, thank goodness) I wa...

By Vyckie @ No Longer Quivering I've skipped church four Sundays in a row now and I'm feeling slightly guilty. It's freezing-ass cold here in Nebraska , and I just have been too lazy to scoop the driveway and drag myself and my children out in sub-zero temps. Considering that I stopped believing in God over two years ago, it seems rather weird that I still spend my Sunday mornings attending the local Salvation Army worship services. So why don't I just quit going? I didn't leave Christianity because of any failure of the people. For the most part, I found the Christians I knew to be sincere, generous and supportive. Misguided and unrealistic, maybe - but hey, that was me too. It was the Bible and Christian doctrine which I finally recognized as ridiculous and even abusive. Through the years, I had become more and more fundamentalist in my beliefs and practices. My diligent study of the scriptures led me to adopt the strict gender roles and patriarchal f...

By Kalos “There are tons of religions in the world… but only ours is right?” I asked my mom, I couldn’t have been much older than five years old. “Yes.” she said, and then smiled and chuckled in a way that seemed to say she was uncomfortable sounding so smug but she did believe what she said. For some reason that explanation was enough for me for so many years to come… Hello, I am a person that knows the Xian community very well. Like many of you I grew up in the church, the Southern Baptist church to be specific. Like anyone I had no idea what I was doing until I was older so I will quickly skip to what Xians would call my testimony. To set the stage I had never really fit in with the kids at my church but my parents pushed me into the youth group. I’m actually happy for that part because it expanded my social comfort zone but that’s a different story. I had a couple friends from school but they were not that close, we just hung out without really talking about anything importa...

By Sean Image via Wikipedia A few old friends ask me why I'm an atheist. Anyone who knew me growing up remembers me as a faithful and religious teenager. What could have possibly happened to the kid who led prayer group every morning before school, organized Chrysalis weekends and professed to love Jesus Christ with all his heart, mind and soul? It was a slow processes, but I'd like to share it and what atheism means to me. Let me set the stage: I have read the Bible cover to cover multiple times and studied some of the most popular modern Christian thinkers like Dobson, Campolo, Colson and many others. I was the 'go to' guy for Biblical information in high school and college. My faith limited or false: at the age of 15, I kneeled and prayed the Sinner's Prayer and asked Jesus Christ to forgive my sins and rule over my life. I spent the better part of a decade working on that relationship, praying daily, trying to be more Christ-like and coming closer to Christ....

By Andrea Image by Mr.OutdoorGuy via Flickr Growing up surrounded by only Christians is strange thing. My parents were Christians and they home-schooled me and my younger sister. Church was like a second home and all our friends were there. I knew a few other home-schooled kids that didn't go to my church, and they were Christians too. I know my parents were only trying to do what they thought was best for me, but I was in a kind of bubble. Since I never talked to anyone with a different opinion, it was really difficult to deal with the teachings in the Bible sometimes. I was terrified of going to hell and really didn't like the teaching of the bible. I mean, hearing that God sent a flood to cover the entire earth and kill everyone except eight people is not very comforting. After short periods of doubt I would put my questions aside. No one had an answer and I had to get along with my family and friends, so I just decided this God must be good after all. In high school...

By Chas Warren Image by Brian Hillegas via Flickr This is going to be long and rambling, but not intentionally. The topic is clearly stated in the title, but in this introductory paragraph, permit me to amplify slightly. In this article, I intend to chart the route of my own non-theism. Call it descent or ascent, but know that I have felt like a mountaineer, struggling towards one peak, only to have another suddenly rise before me, beckoning me to climb again. But the path has never been straight. It has always been circuitous. That’s why this literary map will belong and rambling. I didn’t possess a natural inclination to believe in God. My father decided not to convince me to believe in Santa Claus, and I don’t rue his decision. I still enjoyed Santa, but I understood that he was a pleasant fiction, like Bugs Bunny . It occurred to me by the time that I was in the fourth grade that God might also be a fictitious creation. Of course, this was accompanied by apprehension and fea...