Published by
Growing up I never really considered my religion. I come from a long line of un christened non believers. Although I had been to my cousins christening (an excuse for a family get together and the privilege when older to be married in church) and a communion for some childhood friends I just never really considered an alliance to any faith.
I played around with the idea of alternative beliefs in early adolesance tarot cards and palm reading my conversion to being vegetarian. My mum’s friend was a new age hippy and this is what I understood as the corner stone’s of her beliefs.
At university for the first time I was exposed to religion amongst my peers. People I considered to be intelligent and interesting who had the same interests as me music, clubs, fashion etc were also avid worshipers of different faiths. Most of my friends were denominations of the Christian faith. The catholic’s mostly now none practicing did express to me the notion of catholic guilt. The childhood indoctrination of belief made them feel guilty for the binge drinking late nights and consumer culture Other friends were Baptists and Evangelists both I knew to be Christian but had no idea what the differences were. So I asked them and my friend mumbled something about two baptisms if you were a Baptist which seemed like an overly simple and non very coherent answer for my questioning self.
Looking back I do remember a school trip to a catholic church which was ornately beautiful and a Church of England church which was simple and cold, my new religious friends found fascinating and strange. All I knew about Church of England was that Henry 8th changed Christianity to suit himself so that he had the right to divorce. This to me highlights the idiocies of religion that it has clearly been changed in the past yet people still blindly follow it, my new religious friends would strongly disagree that the ‘church’ had left out gospels or manipulated the truth to suit their cause although this has been well documented. A close friend names the BIBLE as basic instruction before leaving earth and I see it as a nice group of stories made up to give people a moral code to live by coupled with some evidence of the time documented before we fully understood science.
Still given my feelings I still tasseled with the idea of giving church ago. I had friend of other faiths my best friend at university being a Sikh. Her family had at some point departed from being Hindu to become Sikh, reinforcing my ideals that religion is quite fluid and not very serious. Her families were what I would describe as traditional rather than religious. I also had a few Muslim friends, they pitched their religion to me only as having more holidays then Christianity whilst still having the holidays and benefits of being in England a rationally Christian country with national holidays so effectively having double. The fasting put me off this idea also the fundamentalist ideals that were increasingly in the press at that time. Maybe I am not as open minded as I would like to think. That aside, being Caucasian English I felt most culturally in line with the Christian faith and in some intoxicated moments I m sure I felt a slight spiritual connection! I also felt at troubled times a deeper understanding and guidance from religion may give me comfort.
I eventually rested upon the decision that I was agnostic. This seemed like a great option it meant I could be spiritual but not have to actually plump for an organized official religion. This agnostic belief I keep for a few years until my boyfriend challenged me upon its true meaning.
My boyfriend was bought up Seven day Adventist a religion I had never even heard of and certainly did not know was a Christian faith. He was now a proud atheist. He felt religion went against all his philosophical beliefs and was too restrictive for modern living. He encouraged me to explore why I felt a belief system was even needed especially as I was not bought up with prayer, worship or bible teachings. I tried to justify my agnostic position that I did not blindly believe in the bible but felt this spiritual connection which you can describe as a higher power or Mother Nature, whatever you what to define it as. I was fairly uneducated in Bible teachings but knew that Noah and Virgin births were beyond ridiculous and I did not believe in organized religion just some spiritual sense. So he said to me define spiritual and I what came out of my mouth was so in line with the notion of god and Christianity that I could not really position my belief without referring to an established faith. So he suggested to me that I read The God delusion by Richard Dawkins and from that point my position as an atheist was sealed.
It may seem to the reader that I am flakey that I have drifted from one ideal to the other purely based on the people that are around me at the time. That is in part to. I have a naturally questioning nature. I believe all opinions should be informed ones so I ask a lot of others around me to seek wisdom from what they know to fill in the gaps I don’t. I explored upon reading The God delusion my agnostic position and admitted I was just being a fence sitter. Deep down I did not believe in religion at all but was hedging my bets’ just in case’. I sense this is the same for many people, I was just in the privileged position of not being judged as none of my family have religious beliefs. I find organized religion to restricting, the guilt, the rules; they don’t fit in with my lifestyle. I do how ever think the Ten Commandments are an excellent set of basic rules. But all people know the difference between right and wrong we know this from childhood. I don’t think you can have that blind unquestioning belief unless you have been raised in a religious environment from birth and to be honest I pity people that do. The stories of god up a mountain whispering privately in peoples (always men) ears range from the sublime to the ridiculous. Not to mention the rapes and murders the bible is full with, and I know other religious texts are just as violent. These texts were scribed by mere mortals and passed on by the few who could read and write at the time in a way that resembles a version of Chinese whispers. How can people in 2009 follow a book from thousands of years ago with no questions, that‘s like those in 4009 following copies of the Sun newspaper or something almost as ridiculous.
My flirtation with religion is over, that may make me a sinner in the eyes of many but I am more then happy with this status. And I strongly encourage all other fence sitters to read the god delusion by Richard Dawkins and make an informed decision too!
