Recipe for Atheism

OK I’m an atheist.  I didn’t start out that way, but life has a way of shaping us in unexpected ways.  As the oldest of three children, I pretty much got to pioneer childhood for all three of us.  I was fortunate in that respect, because the rules weren’t anywhere near entrenched in my household.  This also meant that I was punished for actions that my folks didn’t have the foresight to tell me not to do.  More likely they just didn’t want to add more fuel for my imagination.  Either way, my environment encouraged me to think about what I was doing and what my reasons were for each action.  I guess you could say that my folks had unwittingly sowed the seeds of atheism in me.

I vaguely remember attending church about one or two times a month before attending school.  I went to a Lutheran service with my mom and her parents and would have fun about half of the time in the children’s youth group.  I will tell you now that the main service is the most boring thing for a preschool child to endure.  Sitting still on those hard benches was definitely not my idea of fun.  In spite of my dislike of church service, I still acquired a belief in God.  It is hard not to when you see that many adults endure the same idiotic hardship for the sake of that same belief.  Yes, I did notice that the adults weren’t all that comfortable.  And the ones with kids would appear tired and profoundly relieved at the end of service.  This pattern continued up through the end of kindergarten.

In the first grade I experienced the first major change of my life.  My parents thought it would be a good idea for me to attend a catholic school.  They were concerned enough about the public school district that we lived in to shell out the money for me to attend private school.  This was an exceptionally good idea.  Had they not made this decision, I would probably have a greater contempt for humanity than my present acerbic level.  At the private school, I was allowed to work ahead of the class in many of the subjects (particularly math and science).  We also had religious study.  I enjoyed this part of class because we did get to openly discuss topics like evolution and morality.  To this day, I still don’t know what Father Mack’s or Father Michael’s views on evolution were.  The priest there had the good sense to leave the answers to the big questions up to the students.  Had they not, I would have definitely dropped my belief in God like a bad habit.  At this time, I had a voracious appetite for science both natural and physical.  I had already finished reading my folk’s encyclopedia set from the front of “A” to the end of “Z”.  The evidence for evolution was very compelling.  I also loved reading about different countries and their cultures and beliefs.  This was the only part of childhood that I would even consider going back to if I could.  During this time, my faith in God grew like a weed.  I had the impression that everyone had the freedom to tailor their beliefs around what we see in the present world and shape their morality around well reasoned argument.  I was impressed enough with the clergy that I wanted to join the priesthood my self.  Life is always changing.  And, my life changed as well when the tuition changed.

We moved to another school district just before the beginning of the sixth grade.  Little did I know, I was going to attend a different school that year.  This was my first exposure to Christians of a different sect.  It is very ironic that while attending a catholic school that the only time I hear about God is during our class for religious instruction which was held twice weekly.  When I got to the new school, I heard more about God from fellow classmates than I ever did at the private school I was attending.  It was during this time that I firsthand witnessed hypocrisy and experienced the devastating fallout.  I later learned that in some of the other sects, instead of focusing on how the young members can develop to become better people, the youth ministers would squander the time instructing kids in how to recruit.  Morality was a set of rules handed down with no discussion on why those rules would be in place.  And my favorite of all, if you didn’t follow their faith and attend their church you were going to hell.  I can tell you right now that my thought to this day is still the same.  If those self righteous hypocrites are going to heaven, I would rather burn in hell for all eternity than share the company of those unthinking beast!  It was this immense dislike of what I found out were most Christians that made me research all of the faiths in a more comprehensive manner.  From my research I discovered that our greatest atrocities were committed in the name of one monotheistic faith or another.  By the end of the sixth grade, I no longer questioned my belief.  I was dead certain that there was no such thing as God.  If humanity was really created in his image, God must have been hideous indeed to behold and definitely not worthy of either my worship or respect. 

For the next twelve years, my views against Christianity and Islam have softened.  I no longer see the ugliness prevalent in mankind as a manifestation of faith.  It is just part of the human animal.  Faith is just one manifestation of our many flaws.  There will always be some ridiculous religion present until mankind learns to use that most amazing organ sitting on top of their shoulders.  Remember this; faith is accepting something without evidence and sometimes in spite of contrary evidence.  This pattern of not using critical thinking is extremely harmful.  How else are we to navigate our present surroundings if we don’t utilize our senses fully? 

Don't pray for me.  Just THINK!!!

Michael Black