#[ so she'd be a theist i believe ]

[cindrelle]

tbh i like that fuu is religious but open - minded to others so long as they’re good people. she doesn’t like people who use religion as an excuse for poor actions. also she’s very curious about others’ beliefs and has accumulated things over the years like tarot cards and other means of divination. 

[atheautistic]

Making a Rock Garden

I had no idea how much fun it could be to have christians come to my door on a Saturday morning until i became an atheist!

A young woman came to the door with her family in tow (very cute kids btw. I think it was hubby's job to watch the kidlets, so i didn't get to talk to him much.

We had a very pleasant conversation. She asked me how i came to be an atheist. Now, if you're a theist, i don't recommend that question. It's an invitation for that atheist to preach, and you definitely don't want that. Not if you like your faith. But, i was sweet, don't worry! Here's the condensed version: Christian for 38 years, learned stuff, doubts, logic problems, learned more stuff, atheist.

Then she asked, "So you don't believe in the Bible?" It was so damn cute. I don't think she'd ever spoken with an atheist before. I kindly let her know that the Bible is a collection of books written by men, translated by men, interpreted by man. I further pointed out that based on the fact that no religion agrees with another, there is no reason to assume that any of the texts they choose for the remaining 66 (72 for you catholics out there!) books of the bible are the inspired word of god, assuming he exists at all.

She sweetly took this criticism and didn't take the bait. It was probably too big a topic to tackle. I think she got the idea that'd I'd done some thinking about that already. She's an excellent tactician! She knew I wanted to go down that road. Honestly, by this time, i think she had figured out she wasn't going to get me, so she switched tactics and went right for the Hail Mary. The infamous christian mental terror attack!

"Jonathan, you have insurance on your car right? Don't you think you should have a heavenly insurance policy for your soul?"

Guys... The abject pain of holding in my mirth almost killed me. Also, ANGER. I mean, this seems awfully similar to extortion right? "Hey, you don't want all this to burn up right? Our little organization can help you wit' dat. Just 10% of your income my man."

Well, i don't pay rent, punk.

But, reason prevailed. I thanked her very sweetly for caring about my soul. Then i told her that her premise was flawed because you can't really analogize anything to God, because there's nothing like him right?

When all i got was a confused look, i told her that i KNOW i need insurance for the car i KNOW exists because i have EVIDENCE that driving can result in accidents that i cannot afford to pay for. Therefore i have car insurance. I haven't seen anything indicating that i need to waste my time and money on an insurance policy that will keep your God from torturing me for eternity for my finite crimes.

I told her she was referring to Pascal's wager which essentially says that it's safer to just believe, in case hell is real. Which is impossible for me because i CANNOT believe without evidence. I'm interested in truth, not fantasy. I also mentioned that if god were to exist, I'm sure he would know i wasn't fond of him. Which wouldn't be very safe for me, would it?

That was the death knell of hope for my soul in her mind I'm sure. She didn't really know what to say, so she sweetly wished me a good day, and left with the kiddos while i wished them better luck.

Although that visit didn't go the way she had hoped, most good christians assuage the worry of that failure by reminding themselves that they planted the seeds of faith in my mind. Problem is that my brain is much too complicated and logical for faith to survive there. I have Many Questions.

But the Christian plays a dangerous game when trying to sow the seeds of faith in the stony minds of atheists recovering from religious trauma. I think that a strange sort of psychological Locarde's exchange principal1 happens during productive discourse. It's a sharing of ideas, isn't it? So i get to plant things in her garden too. My beautiful rocks...

Rock 1: A 38 year Christian fell from the Faith, but seems happy. Says he feels free...

Rock 2.: everything that guy said was with authority and i couldn't challenge him (that's important to theists)

Rock 3-6 : He pointed out logical problems i don't know the answer to.

Rock 7: This man is clearly educated. He seemed to suggest that learning led him away from the faith. Why is that the educated people are often atheists?

Rock 8 - 12: He pointed out several times that God adds no explanatory or predictive power for understanding the world around us. God is not necessary to explain anything. I couldn't refute it.

Its just a few pebbles of course. But pretty good sized ones!

One day i hope she'll see them, and see how real they are. How beautiful they are. I hope she gets more of them. I Hope she gets some training and comes back for round two so i can sow some more rocks. I hope they slowly choke the weeds of faith that have taken over her mind and finally set her free from the ugly overgrowth of religion. Hopefully, she'll end up with a beautiful rock garden too!

1. Locarde's exchange principal is usually applied to forensic science, so it's not a perfect analogy I'm afraid. But the idea is that; everything that makes contact with another thing leaves evidence of that contact on each thing. So, i touch a surface, which i leave a fingerprint on, and my finger gets dust on it from the surface.

[atheostic]

That's definitely not the experience I've had in interactions with theist Jews on this site.

I'm told that I'm culturally Christian (with the implication that they aren't) specifically because I'm an atheist Latina. No, it doesn't matter that I was raised secular. No, it doesn't matter that I'm Indigenous from a tribe that prides itself in repelling Christian missionaries.

I've asked them every single time if that means that Latino Jews are culturally Christian too and never have I ever heard a single response back beyond calling me names like "asshole", "moron", "idiot", and being told to go kill myself.

You're the first Jewish person I've ever heard say "yes" to this question.

Which leads me to your answer:

Yes, there definitely can be people assimilated, but just because you live in a society that has a majority religion doesn't necessarily mean that you'll be assimilated to that religion. The reality in the US is not universal to every country nor every person. The Jewish experience is also not universal to people of other religions (or lack thereof).

As I tell the aforementioned Jews who insist I'm culturally Christian, I was raised secular. Secular atheists have a very distinct way of raising their kids that's nothing like how Christian parents raise their kids. Hell, it's distinct from how parents of any religion that I've seen raise their kids.

For example, most secular atheist children are introduced to religion via comparative religion. We're introduced to different religious beliefs, shown what science has been able to prove, and left to make our own conclusions. My mom didn't tell me what she believed in until I explicitly asked her months after being introduced to religion. She also explicitly told me that it didn't matter what I decided I believed in and that she'd support me unconditionally no matter what; that if I decided I believed in a certain religion and wanted to go to worship she'd take me as often as I'd like.

I'm also Indigenous from a tribe (Nambikwara) that has a long and proud history of resisting Christianity.

And I'm Brazilian-Canadian; in Canada, society doesn't have the expectation of assimilation in the way that the US does -- it's just not a thing here. People wear their ethnic and religious clothing without issue (well, for the most part; unfortunately, there's always gonna be local bigots being their bigot-y selves no matter where you go). People typically retain their heritage language (I looked into it recently and according to StatsCan roughly 80% of Canadians speak 2 or more languages). Even white Canadians whose families have been in Canada so long that all they have retained about the culture is dancing and/or food still refer to themselves as *insert nationality here*-Canadian. Asking someone where they're from in Canada doesn't have the racist implication that it does in the US because everyone asks everyone that.

And in Brazil, the situation is nothing like in Canada OR the US.

Tbh I'm kinda surprised at the "cultural Christian" discourse. Like is it that hard to accept that maybe spending your whole life in a Christian nation may have affected your worldview somewhat