Since I abandoned Christianity several years ago, my life has changed dramatically. For the obvious reasons, of course, but also in ways I couldn't have possibly foreseen. As passionately as I used to wave my salvation banner and go to arms against co-workers and friends in Jesus' name – I now find myself avoiding discussing Christianity at all costs. Many people that knew me believed leaving the church was an easy choice - that was hardly the case. I felt like a child walking out on elderly parents. Abandoning what raised me, taught, disciplined, and loved me; made my existence have purpose, and gave me confidence about my place amid the chaos that surrounds us…and most terrifying of all – abandoning the one thing that I was lead to believe would never leave me or forsake me. All for the luxuries of drugs, sex, and alcohol…or so the envious faithful like to believe.
It was not an easy decision – but like most difficult things in life, ultimately worth the initial pain and heartache since I now live a life more fulfilling than I ever dreamed possible before. It's a beautiful thing to be free to love and surround myself with whomever I please, their worth based simply on their own merit and not valued solely for who they are with Christ's aid.
To get to the point, there are a couple big reasons I avoid discussing Christianity with others. Part of it is sadness over 21 years lost, and the other is the overwhelming guilt I will carry with me forever for the atrocious things I believed about innocent people, and for the god I so vehemently defended. A diety whose words encouraged and exalted my hatred and intolerance for behaviors and people I knew nothing about. Watching programs or documentaries on Christians (of all dominations) reduces me to tears – tears of joy that I live a life unbounded by archaic tradition and superstition, and tears of grief for all the people I know whose minds are not yet free.
Religulous was the first program I have fully watched and soaked in since I "put away childish things" and abandoned my hope in Christ. Its message of doubt encouraged and lifted me up more than I can possibly describe. I will not be content until every person I know has seen it and given its message a moment of reflection.
The following passage is Bill Maher's ending monologue. Read and enjoy. Then tell your friends.
Cheers.
The plain fact is, religion must die for mankind to live. The hour is getting very late to be able to indulge in having key decisions made by religious people, by irrationalists, by those who would steer the ship of state not by a compass, but by the equivalent of reading the entrails of a chicken.
George Bush prayed a lot about Iraq, but he didn't learn a lot about it.
Faith means making a virtue out of not thinking. It's nothing to brag about. And those who preach faith and enable and elevate it are our intellectual slaveholders, keeping mankind in a bondage to fantasy and nonsense that has spawned and justified so much lunacy and destruction.
Religion is dangerous because it allows human beings who don't have all the answers to think that they do. Most people would think it's wonderful when someone says: "I'm willing, Lord. I'll do whatever You want me to do."
Except that since there are no gods actually talking to us, that void is filled in by people with their own corruptions, limitations and agendas.
And anyone who tells you they know... they "just know" what happens when you die, I promise you, you don't. How can I be so sure? Because I don't know, and you do not possess mental powers that I do not.
The only appropriate attitude for man to have about the big questions is not the arrogant certitude that is the hallmark of religion, but doubt. Doubt is humble, and that's what man needs to be, considering that human history is just a litany of getting shit dead wrong.
This is why rational people, anti-religionists, must end their timidity and come out of the closet and assert themselves.
And those who consider themselves only moderately religious really need to look in the mirror and realize that the solace and comfort that religion brings you actually comes at a terrible price.
If you belonged to a political party or a social club that was tied to as much bigotry, misogyny, homophobia, violence and sheer ignorance as religion is, you'd resign in protest. To do otherwise is to be an enabler, a Mafia wife, with the true devils of extremism that draw their legitimacy from the billions of their fellow travelers.
If the world does come to an end here or wherever, or if it limps into the future, decimated by the effects of a religion-inspired nuclear terrorism, let's remember what the real problem was:
That we learned how to precipitate mass death before we got past the neurological disorder of wishing for it.
That's it. Grow up or die.
See you in Heaven.
Who knows?
Yeah, exactly.
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