27 June 2012
(This is a long post, just to warn you.)
I've never been one for religion. My father was an atheist, but wanted me to choose my own religious path and so, never spoke to me about religion until I was 15. My mother took a more active part in my religious education, by buying me a book of the Bible Stories, and asking a friend of the family, a Jehovah's Witness, to help her with Bible Studies. The format in which I was presented the Bible stories however, was at first as bedtime stories, and so, I took them to be no more truthful than the stories of Jack and his Beanstalk, or wooden puppets whose noses grow when they lie. But I soon realised my mother and her friend, indeed, the majority of my family took them to be, pardon the pun, gospel truth. I was at an age where I wouldn't question the information I got from my mother, but I soon realised she couldn't explain satisfactorily most of the many many philosophical questions I had about the world, purpose, and existence. So at the age of about 12 I decided I didn't believe what she was telling me. I read inadvertently about the scientific ideas about the origins of the universe, and decided these sounded, to my untrained self, more beautiful and poetic than a primordial being shouting the universe into existence. So I read more into them, finding out there was also an overwhelming amount of evidence in favour of those ideas. I was happy with this, and decided to ask my mother about it, soon learning she didn't know much about it, but was happy for me to choose my own beliefs as long as I didn't impinge upon my younger siblings my choices. I was happy with this, and although I spent the next few years learning more and more about particle theory, and quantum mechanics et cetera, I never really thought about my personal theology much, learning and applying the word 'atheist' along the way. About a year ago, however, at the age of 17, I visited an aunt, who was annoyed about her sister-in-law who had come to her home and tried, rather innocuously, to impose her own beliefs upon her home for the weekend. She spoke to me about it for a few minutes, before realising she didn't know which side I fell on, and asked me which religion I was. I told her I was an atheist, and, pleasantly surprised (there being only two other atheists in my family) she asked me why. I told her I didn't really believe the incredible stories of the Bible, but hadnt given it much thought beyond that. She told me she was an antitheist, and actively disliked religion. I was intrigued, as I'd only ever thought of religion as a force for good, albeit, one which worked on OTHER people. She recommended I read The God Delusion (which I recommend to anyone reading this), and I went immediately to buy it. It piqued my curiosity in the subject. I read my way through Christopher Hitchens' God Is Not Great, Sam Harris' The End Of Faith and Richard Dawkins' God Delusion. In search of more material, I took to YouTube, watching my way through all of the Debates between prominent atheists and Christian or Muslim scholars. I then discovered RationalWiki, and The Atheist Experience tv show, and The Amazing Atheist, educating myself slowly, and slowly putting together pictures of religious dogmas, and correcting misconceptions perpetuated by a mostly religious society. I went in search of people my age to talk to as I got better at discussing it myself, and soon realised every religious person I asked soon fell back on the idea of faith. An idea I vehemently dislike, as it provides nothing more than an end to critical thinking. A roadblock to learning about philosophical or scientific questions. As it stands now, I am an antitheistic, antireligious agnostic atheist (agnostic and atheist are not mutually exclusive, agnostic means to not know, and atheist refers to belief), and I'm still greatly interested by religious ideas, (I'm currently reading the Bible,) and I'm always ready to discuss it, but never one to bring it up, as I have learned that people's religious beliefs are often the foundation of how they live their life. I also learned that although I should respect other people's right to believe what they do, I have no obligation to respect their belief itself, and should only extend the respect the belief deserves.
Why I'm An Atheist • Opuss № I