Please answer this question if you were a serious Christian( not a liberal one), and then turned to atheism. How did you get over the fear of hell, and banishment of God? Because the way i see it if you were a committed Christian, you must have been scared, because i can't even imagine the thought of leaving God (I'm not planing to) it just terrifies me
How long did it take you to get over being afraid of hell?
Serious answers only please, I just want to know how you felt when you finally made the decision.
Just me, Ur retarded... u didn't even answer my question
I was raised southern baptist. When I was 11 I realized that things in the buy-bull just didn't make sense. There are too many contradictions, and come on...an invisible bogyman in the sky???
I was never afraid of hell. I considered myself to be a serious Christian until I was about age eight, and then I realized that none of Christianity made sense. I was feeling confused, as if I had sinned, but then I remembered that sinning is void if you don't believe in it.
I felt more free when I finally made the decision.
Ok maybe I wasn't a serious Christian still I was to a certain point cause of elementary school.
I realized it was an arbitrary (If I am born in an atheist family I will almost automatically go to Hell? and anyway I could have been born the Pope like I could I have been born Richard Dawkins when I think about it)
I was raised in the Bible Belt of the United States. Fundi Christianity has been forced down my throat my whole life. A couple years ago I slowly just started realizing how ridiculous my creed was and just started searching for answers. Eventually, I lost all fear of God and was finally free from the min drape Christianity was.
I was pretty young. But what happened was I realized that Genesis was just wrong. The exact point that got me was having the Sun created the day after the plants.
I sat down after that and actually read the book. I wasn't out of Genesis when I was openly laughing at what it said.
It's hard to be frightened of a story you think is funny. You cross the line when you stop believing. It's not really scary when you don't believe.
My main issue was wanting to be wrong....not being afraid I was. Leviticus and Deuteronomy got me over that part.
First of all, you obviously think of yourself as a serious Christian. So you define yourself as better than other Christians. That shows your ego not your belief.
Secondly there is no hell. There is nothing to fear from God. When you come to realize this you will see what the teachings of Paul has done to the teachings of Jesus.
i just got it into my head than the idea of God was stupid and since then i did not care about hell or heaven anymore , i must accept though than i did had to do lots of reading to understand how the idea came into effect , and realized than in the old days people would use anything to scare their stronger enemies with scary stories so than they would not get attacked , and till this day i believe this is how it all started . i also realized through history reading than Christianity is nothing more than the copy of a copy of a copy of way older deities which other people had in the time of the Egyptians and than most other religions are the same way .. i also had to do a fact check about stuff i was taught about when i was Christian and found out than most of that stuff had been stated as a hoax long ago , sad me didn't knew about it , one of those things were the so called voices of hell tape or should i say the hoaxed voices from hell tape .
I was brought up Lutheran and became an atheist in college, and I will tell you, even though I was a grown woman and had been leaning more and more toward atheism for several years, the final decision, to realize in my own heart that I could no longer lie to myself and say that I believed in god, that moment was scary indeed.
All the teachings about hell and all came up in my face and I thought that most common thought, what if I'm wrong? I remembered my pastors always saying that it is the devil who is trying to take me away from god and that I must not let him.... it took me a while to get past that kind of thinking.
The way I got past it completely was, after not thinking about religious stuff for years, just ignoring it, I started reading some books about religions and their history, and it was all put into perspective in a very mature and reasonable way. I saw, and felt, and understood in my guts, the chicanery, the lies and the reasons for the lies, that is all the stuff of religions, and I realized not only why they are all fake, but also why it is so difficult to get over that "feeling" of what if you are wrong.
If you get that feeling, then religions have been successful at brainwashing you.
But I got past it, and anyone who wants to can do it too. I recommend reading "The Chalice and the Blade" and "The God Delusion" for those seeking the truth.
In grade school for me. Nothing in Christian doctrine made sense to my young mind. A talking snake? Burning in hell forever? Killing the firstborn sons because he's a loving God? No, not much made sense to me. I was never afraid of hell, I never believed that a God who professed love for me would make one. I went to Catholic schools for elementary, high school and college. Jesuit Georgetown for a few after that. At first to keep Mom happy but after that because of the high quality of education. I don't think I was a very good Christian in true sense of the word.
well, i became an agnostic, but it just takes some time. I had questioned god since I was about 13, but I too was so scared of burning in hell for all of eternity. For almost 3 years I tried so so hard to have faith and believe in god that it was ridiculous. I went to church all of the time, prayed all of the time, including the rosary once a day for a year and a half, and reading parts of the bible every day. I tried to force myself to believe, but the faith just wasn't there, and I became a deist first, which is where you believe in a god, but you just see him through nature and you believe that he is removed. During this phase I almost went back to Christianity multiple times out of fear of hell. But then I realized that if there is a god at all, then he wouldn't damn me to hell for not blessing me with faith. How could a loving, caring, god damn me to hell for something that was his fault? Even though I am essentially a good person? I wouldn't want to be with god for all of eternity if he is going to do that. At this same time I also realized that there is no way to really know if there is a god or not, you can't prove it one way or another. So just enjoy your life you are living here now, and stop worrying whether or not there is a next one. Do what you think is right, let your head guide your decisions, not a 2000 year old outdated religion. It sounds like here that you are already questioning your faith, and so keep questioning and thinking. Who knows, maybe Christianity is right. Im just going to have to wait until I die to figure it out
Dear, Atheists who were formerly Christians?
