I’m an atheist, I have been called every name in the book from “lost” to “Satan”. I am none of these. It has not been an easy path and I am now the least trusted group in the world, but why? What have I done aside from examine everything and decide for myself? Do people think this was easy for me? No, I spent a huge part of my life in what could be called a Messianic Cult, I even came out as a non-believer in it. I would read my Torah (Old Testament) 5 times and study every detail hoping to find the answers, but all I found was the hate, the lies, the pieces of this puzzle that refused to fit together. I tried to smash them together to MAKE them fit. I wanted them to fit more then anything. As I found out I was being lied to, I cried. I would lock myself in rooms in this church we rented and just sob, sob because I felt alone, sob because I thought I was going to hell all because God was ignoring my cries to Him. I wanted His answers to my questions so bad I had tried to kill myself. I wanted to meet Him, maybe He would understand. I tied a noose around my neck and jumped off the top bunk. I heard the crack, I felt the snap as my lower body went numb. I thought I was dead, I hoped I was dead.
As I came too again after dangling there for what felt like only mere seconds, I opened my door. I was meet with the same layout. I pinched myself, punched, burned, cut, and even sandpapered my arm raw. Anything to confirm where I was, still pleading to who I hoped would hear this small child’s voice and take pity.
There was no answer, months and years passed as my sadness worsened and my mind descended into chaos. These thoughts and emotions now multiplied by hormones and a changing body. Still alone, now thrown into a public school with false knowledge shoved down my throat. Taught to not question the Bible, with violence, beatings, and stern discipline. I crumpled under the pressure of bullies and felt even smaller, even less then who I ever could be.
I hate myself, I hate you, I hate everything. Nothing made sense, I was still so alone even tho I stood in a busy hallway. I wanted to end it all, mostly end myself.
My environment then suddenly changed, I was given and took the one chance I had to switch schools. I realized I was unknown here. I could be anyone. Be anything. I no longer had to be me, that scared, alone, beaten, ex cult member. I digress.
Rewind a few years and I’m cleaning the bathroom, it was then I decided to let my doubts be heard. F*** it. I had already tried suicide, if they followed the Bible (practice what they preached) to the letter they should have then taken me outside the city and stoned me to death. I was prepared, I kinda wanted them too. What left did I have to fear aside from hell?
Instead I got a frying pan thrown at me and another beating. It wavered me not an inch in my convictions. I knew in my heart that nothing I was being told made sense. My brain wouldn’t allow it, it refused to try to lie for this God. God is perfect, right? God knows all right? God speaks to all right? Then why does His perfect word not make sense, filled with so many laws that don’t make sense, and more then all, why doesn’t He just speak to me and clear this all up?
It was then, with my mind screaming the obvious at me. It’s logical conclusion the only answer to my questions, my stress, my ‘doubts’. There is almost with 99.9% correctness no god/gods. Why else would there be no God to show this child love. To rescue me, to kill me. It made sense and it was the ONLY answer that my mind would accept. It all made sense. That is why I was willing to die for it, because it felt like the truth, it is most likely the truth, and if I am wrong God will beg for my forgiveness or God/s will understand and know why I choose what I did, and more then that accept me for me, because the god I use to believe in was based off love.
Since then I haven’t become ‘evil’. Nor do I eat babies. I try my best to live a life that helps others. I want to be remembered as a person who made a difference. I live with no fear of heaven or hell anymore. I do good because it makes me feel good. My mom is proud of me and still loves me. Those who know me, call me a good person. If I suffer hell for this, then God was never worth my worship to start with. I am an atheist.