Yes it is true I AM AN ATHEIST.

Somebody posted a thread from 2005 where I said I did not believe in the invisible sky god and then I backtracked later and said I did. There was doubts on my sincerity. Please I do NOT believe any more. A lot has changed since 2005, I learned a lot about how much evil the world is and how there possibly could not be a god. I learned that my mental illnesses caused me to have delusions like "religious experiences."

Please forgive me for past mistakes. Please help me now, I feel free, but sometimes scared.

One bit of advice needs to be repeated:

Please do not make a hasty decision and abandon your faith if it has been a source of comfort for you in the past. Atheists have nothing to replace it with. During this crisis, look to your fellow believers for guidance as well. I know many of them have had similar experiences.

You do not have to decide anything now, take your time, talk to believers and non, and don't forget that for many believers, faith is part of their life journey, it changes and grows just as they do.

With experience you will gain wisdom, you may abandon your old beliefs or exchange them for new ones. Atheism is not a cure, it is simply a lack of belief in gods.

I will be here to support you no matter what you decide, elshiva, and I'm sure my fellow atheists will stand by you too.

:hug:

You are a thoughtful, forgiving person. It is great that a person can learn from past mistakes, but it is even better that others can forgive these mistakes.

This is not a hasty decision. I have had doubts on and off for years. Again, I am not a scientific person or a philosopher. I am an emotional person. I hope I don't have be a scientist or philosopher to fit in with the smart people on this board. However, I know there are atheists in all walks of life, plumbers, bakers, construction workers, etc.

Thanks for all of your patience.

Just don't tell the folks in R/T, I have my reputation to think about. :evilgrin:

And no, of course you don't need to be a scientist or philosopher to fit in here; the only thing all atheists have in common is a lack of belief in god(s). You'll find we're just as emotional as believers, we're also just as insecure and dysfunctional; we suffer from depression and struggle with addiction, and we know we don't have all the answers.

We're not "smart people" because we're atheists. We do tend to be skeptical because once you get past The Big Lie you're much more likely to question everything else you've been told, and many of us take up for science because it is as misrepresented and vilified as atheism.

I never had much difficulty with my beliefs, or lack of them, since I knew from a pretty young age. But for someone who has been quite devout, it must be extremely difficult. Thank you for your kindness. I'm in her corner, too, whatever she decides. And decisions can change many times over a lifetime. :-)

Rhiannon:hug:

I've spent most of my life going "wtf?"

But my parents are strong believers, and just dragged me to church for most of my young life. So I made up my mind for myself...:shrug:

My dad refused to go to catechism when he kept getting in trouble for asking questions - I think he was eight at the time. He never looked back.

I went through confirmation at age ten, but I don't remember learning much, just the creeds that I already knew by heart, after being in church for all those years.:shrug:

My Dad was actually a bit of a rebel. My grandfather was Irish Catholic and my grandmother was WASP Protestant, unusual for the day, but my Dad decided to join the Episcopal church, since he was very talented, musically, and wanted to sing in their choir. My grandmother said that she didn't mind where he went to church as long as he went somewhere. He was 12, so was probably as much as a rebel for his day as we are now, and my grandmother was pretty enlightened, too, for her generation, since she let my Dad make his own choices.:-)

BTW, my grandmother was a lifelong Republican, even voted against FDR, but she had a change of heart later in life and voted for Bill Clinton, twice. She called me to tell me about it in 1992, and I told her that I did, as well, since I voted for Democrats since Jimmy Carter, but that we didn't need to tell the rest of the family...;)

Drives the other men in my life bat-shit crazy, though. I've come to regard the phrase "What the hell is wrong with you?" as a compliment. :D

I think I would love your family. True progressives never think you're too young or old to rebel.

Born without, like everybody else. I just happen to have endured little of the cultural imperative to BELIEVE at home.

I even have the experience of giving (American-Pop-Christian) God belief an honest try through immersion, since nearly everyone dear to me were unequivocal believers. If 99% of the country was tuned to a different wavelength, it was possible, perhaps probable even, that I was wrong. And those who helped lift me from the horrorshow of my childhood, for no other reason than they loved me, might've been on to something...

I may as well have just spent the time playacting I was an Arr-Matey Pirate instead. It wouldn't have been any more absurd than the emphatic -- GOD IS LORD, LOVING, JUST, REAL -- cant expected of me. And frankly, it was plainly obvious the bulk of the other Christians were coasting on assertion, instead of conviction.

It lifts my day to see you again, Scottie. I worried about you :hi:

That's exactly what it was like for me, a natural atheist trying to feel my way through a world full of believers. Hoo boy, talk about naive...

I missed you, charlie. :hug:
I hope you are well.

Since when are there no comforts outside faith? You said yourself atheism is just a lack of belief in gods (and a sincere thank you for getting that right!) so how could atheism lack any comforts but that specific one? People can find comfort in others, in study, in hobbies, in charitable works, in booze, in sports or games, in drugs, in family, in pets, in therapy yadda yadda yadda, A lack of faith precludes only the comfort from faith itself, and once someone becomes an atheist they quickly find that there is a comfort in being able to rationally approach issues or questions without the constraining tautology of a deity. It makes it much easier to follow where the evidence leads in considering all manner of fascinating questions. I find that intellectual freedom very comforting.

EDIT - a sincere best wishes and congratulations to the OP. If you once had a strong faith (i never did) the transition can be stressful I know. But don't get discouraged by the idea that atheism has nothing to offer. It has everything in the world to offer except beleif in gods.

The absence of belief in deities is not a hobby or a charity, it doesn't have the same effect as alcohol or drugs, it also isn't a sport, game, family, pet or a replacement for therapy.

If you need a philosophy, google humanism.

Your statement as I recall was something like "if you drew comfort from your faith, atheism has nothing to replace that with".

Since atheism is simply a position on gods you can replace the comfort you get from faith with comfort from any other source, including the comfort of being free from the axiomatic assumption that there is a god.

There are comforts outside of faith and you imply above that you agree with this - why cannot any one or any number of them replace the comfort from faith? The only possible argument that they cannot is to boldly state that no comfort can be comparably effective, which is both subjective and an assumption in its own right.

Check out the Ingersoll quote below - he explains the comforts of atheism with a skill that is beyond me (and most others too). This though is only the comforts of atheism per se. I frankly don't take much day to day comfort from atheism. It only strikes me whenever I consider a question which would be tainted by a pre-existing assumption of divine existence. It strikes me quite strongly then of course. That still leaves us with the myriad other comforts, a passing few of which I mentioned. If faith is not like any of those how can they all offer comfort to many just like faith does? Even if faith offers more comfort than any (again back to subjective assumptions) then what is wrong with cumulative comforts to replace it?

I just find it quite condescending for theists to assume that whatever comfort/strength/peace whatever they get from religion cannot possibly be duplicated in others without it. Since faith is nothing more than belief without evidence (even theists surely cannot quibble with this, or belief in god would be a matter of science rather than faith), a hardcore fan of the Mets has as much right, and EXACTLY the same mechanism, to draw comfort from hopes of a World Series win as a believer can from hopes of divine justice and love. You will find the comparison objectionable perhaps, but then again a Mets fan could at least demonstrate there is a greater objective probability of his hopes being fulfilled. Slightly ;).

I don't really need an additional philosophy, and have my quibbles with Humanism especially big H if I did. I do not need to google either.

You can replace one blankie with another, but atheism is not a blankie at all, it is the absence of one.

I believe that's why it's so frightening for some new atheists.

In the past, elshiva was VERY religious, her faith was a major part of her life. I was simply being honest with her.

on edit Warpy said it better than I when she posted the following in the first thread:

"Letting go of living your life in fear of judgment and hell is easy. Letting go of the possibility of a protective imaginary friend in the sky is much more difficult."

Atheism just means you can't draw comfort from belief in gods any more. It doesn't stop you seeking comfort from wherever you like. That's kind of the point of atheism. It has no unifying descriptive value of what you are, only what you are not. It takes away just one blankie from a nearly infinite range of blankies, and maybe gives you a sheet or a duvet or a pillow of unrestrained rational inquiry in return as a nice bonus.

The PERCEPTION that there is no comfort in atheism may be what scares a lot of new atheists I agree - it's a question I've seen often come up on the old talk shows I did for public access, but that's not a reality. You may really really like peanut butter, but when you find you have an allergy you simply seek out other foods you really really like - you don't assume a peanut allergy means you can never enjoy food again.

Atheism is the null hypothesis. It is nothing but the absence of belief in deities. You can add whatever world views and pseudo-religious philosophy you want, but you're still starting from zero.

getting odd the junk can be difficult.

"getting odd the junk can be difficult." I never heard that before, but it sounds interesting.

My bad...It was suppost to be "getting off the junk can be difficult." As in, religion can be like that of a narcotic or any drug that someone becomes addicted to and getting off of it or away from it can be difficult.

Why do you feel the necessity to announce it? In all caps?

"Hey, look at me, I'm an atheist!"

I'm not used to seeing that.

Can you explain?

to emphasise what they were saying.

It just seems logical to think so, no? And from there, it's not a huge jump to think that their atheism was challenged by someone, sometime, and they decided to announce it here with emphasis.

But it just seems odd that a person would be so desperate for attention and validation.

If anyone here doubts my "atheist credentials", I'll tell them to go fuck themselves. I won't scream (all caps) at them.

Seems odd to me.

There are lots of things you do differently to someone else.

I can only presume this is one of those things.

As I wrote before, I am very much an idiot. I am mentally insane with schizoaffective disorder, depression, anxiety disorders etc.

I wrote this thread because of a mistake that I made in 2005 that popped up...

here's a link: I made a mistake, I'm sorry. What else can I do?

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=263&topic_id=32136&mesg_id=32147

Nobody said anything about being offended. I said I was curious.

I had read that previous thread and I had responded to BMUS's post.

But I still do not understand why it is so important to you that you be recognized and accepted as a non-religious person.

Remember, on the internet, you can be anything you want to be. And very few of us are likely to believe claims made about personal attributes in an atmosphere where verification is impossible. My experience is that the longer and louder those claims are made, the less likely they are to be true.

And regarding your mental illness, I sympathize. But professing mental illness does not enhance the veracity of your other claims. Perhaps you should wait until your therapy is more successful to continue this line of discussion.

I promise I will stay off this forum. Here's wishing you the best of health and happiness.

If I'm wrong, I'm wrong. But right now, I'm not biting.

Same here.

Okay. I'll bite. Three years can change things. You wrote of freedom . . .

I love this one, a friend framed it for me. Don't need to read it much anymore, but it's eloquent.



-Cindy in Fort Lauderdale

Always one of my favorites. The current inverse-snobbery fad to turn all writing into bland 3rd grade level faux Hemingway with no use of expressive language or joyful prose would deprive us of such gems.