Why I am an atheist (Part 3)

By the time I was in the 7th, I was pretty much an agnostic or a lazy atheist. Most of what organised religion taught was rather repellent to me.  The hatred and fear was suffocating. Every week in church there was more paranoia, more distrust, more rules, more clashes with reality.

Over the years it began to wear me down. The Catholic Church to which I was a part of was vehemently against homosexuality calling homosexual individuals sick and degenerate. I was enrolled in an all boys school, so as one can imagine there was no shortage of gay teenagers. I was friends with quite a few and I found them to be no different from any other human being on the planet. This clash of doctrine and reality had a profound effect on me. It showed me how callous and pity-less the church was when it sermonizes to its congregants to hate LGBTQ individuals. I saw first hand how homophobia was linked to church doctrine and how horribly teenagers were bullied for their perceived or actual sexual orientation.

The treatment of women too was another aspect that drew me further away. Just reading Leviticus and Deuteronomy in the Bible was enough to make me revile the religion my parents chose for me.

This clash whereby doctrine espoused by the church was not practical in the modern world was quite stark. It made me realize that, religious doctrine and reality could not go hand in hand. It was around the 10th grade when I finally decided to finally resist my religion. My first act of rebellion was to purposefully refuse to attend Friday Mass with the rest of my classmates and instead I sat with my non-Catholic classmates and played chess. A Brother came looking for me and asked me why I didn't attend. I never gave him an answer and he didn't really have time, so I was off the hook. That was that, the world did not end, God did come down from heaven to punish me or hunt me down. Nothing happened. I had begun to resist. I no longer attended mass with my family, I avoided Cathecism. By the time I was in the 11th grade I was openly an atheist.

Why I am an atheist (Part 2)

I was heavily in doubt about my faith by the time I was in the 6th grade. I attended Cathecism and church regularly. But it was to no avail. Nothing what the priests and teachers ever said answered questions I had, about life, existence, heaven or hell, etc. I just couldn't wrap my head around how an all knowing, all powerful god, could exist when there was death and destruction all around me.

One of the starkest memories of this time was when I was passing a road accident along the highway, the bodies were being laid along the side of the road, women and children. The sight haunted me and it reminded me of my own mortality. I tried to rationalize it by imagining these people went to heaven, but the concept of heaven made no sense. My child mind at the time asked a childish question, that I have never received a satisfactory answer from anyone who supports the concept of heaven, "What was I supposed to do in heaven for eternity?" Think about it, human beings are terribly fickle and are never satisfied with any one activity, why would heaven be different? So what were people to do for eternity? The fact that the concept of heaven can be defeated by such a childish question, is indicative on how absurd the idea of heaven is.

I was considering changing faiths, maybe joining Hinduism or Islam by this time, but I was saved from such a fate, by a animated Japanese TV show called Full Metal Alchemist. It follows two brothers who are orphaned at a young age and tells their story as they try to survive in brutal fascist dictatorship of an imaginary country. One episode when I was in the 7th grade had a confrontation between them and a charlatan priest. In this episode he asks them which God they believe in and they gave a reply that struck me, they tell him they don't believe in any gods. Before that day atheism was never known to me, after that day I found something I could resonate with, concerning my beliefs anyway and that was a belief in the non-existence of no divinity. I learnt that I did not have to believe in one of the other religion but I could choose the none option. It was an eye opener for me. The scene has stayed engraved in my mind till this day.

This is the importance of the media plays in introducing new ideas. Most of the time television is useless but every now and then it can introduce new ideas and for this I am appreciative.

I began researching into atheism from that the day. The internet helped a lot. I read books and articles from men and women like Richard Dawkins, Christopher Hitchens, Gora, Nietzche, PB Shelly, etc.
I still however remained agnostic and still attended mass and Cathecism diligently.

My full de-conversion into atheism happened much later. But these incidents and access to information via the TV and Internet played an important role shaping my beliefs.

Why I am an atheist. (Part 1)

Ever since I have been more open with my lack of religious belief, people have been asking me why it is so. Before I could even open my mouth to properly reply, people ascribed that I have family trouble, I am sick, or that I am angry with god/s. They aren't interested in my  reasons, they just want me to have some sort of life problem so that they can stereotype me as angry, scared or misunderstood. This is because they don't want to hear a point of view that is radically different to theirs. They are scared and mistrustful of me. Personally I don't really know why, I am generally a harmless individual. Many scholars have ascribed different reasons for this but I will address them in another article.

People want to ascribe just one particular reason for my lack of belief but as with most things in life that is not true. There can be dozens of causes for something, just as my atheism. Thus I will need to make a series of posts exploring my reasons for quitting faith, for it is vast. My reasons for being an atheist are numerous, but first a background of myself is necessary to give context. I was born into a quasi-liberal Catholic family. But unlike most Catholic families mine was different. My father had been born into the Hindu tradition but converted to Catholicism to marry my mother. He, like most converts was quite fanatical in a lazy sort of way. His siblings however did not convert and thus I had uncles and aunts who were Hindus. I also had relatives who were Hindus from my mom's side. Thus my family was not exactly homogenous in their faiths. This played an important role in my de-conversion. I also lived in an eclectic neighborhood of many faiths, there were Christians, Hindus, Animists, Muslims, Buddhists, etc which was very important for me.

I imagined God to be some benevolent being looking out for our best interests. There was no contradiction between the different religions around me, I assumed they were all real and each had a sense of innate goodness.

One of the clearest memories of my childhood happened in the kindergarten, on September 11, 2001. My family was surrounding the TV late at night. Planes had flown into the World Trade Center, (I had no idea what that meant, all I saw was smoke coming out of two big looking buildings),  tiny shapes were falling out of the building, (I didn't realize what they were at the time, but I learnt years later they were people jumping to their deaths not wanting to choke on the smoke) and finally the two towers collapsed. My family were gasping, shocked. Thousands had died. Over the coming days the news channels revealed the identities of the men involved in the terrorist act. The words they used were "religion", "Islam", "Jihad", " fanatics", etc. (I had Muslim friends so I understood a bit as to what they meant). Men of God had been involved in the slaughter, I was confused. News after that constantly talked of wars, of impending attacks, of death, (I had no sense of geography at the time so I was terrified of being caught in one of such attacks). At the time, being a child I could not comprehend the events that were happening fully but they played a major role in life and the life of many atheists till this day. I am a part of a generation who saw planes fly into a building and watched thousands die, all in the name of God by men of God.

Soon however, I some how rationalized that since Muslims had been involved only Islam was capable of such attacks. I moved on blissfully with my life, my faith slightly shaken but not destroyed.

This may not have de-converted me, but for me and I believe for many others it played an important role in their future de-conversions.