What de-conversion feels like

[Eudaimonist]

But when I went on to full Atheism, I felt I was floating around in an empty void.

I'm sorry to hear that. My experience is very different, but then I'm not merely an "atheist". I have a philosophy of life. Maybe that's what makes the difference.

Their is stuff out their you cannot see, but you can feel. Tell you never feel a presence from anyone?

I never feel a presence from anyone aside from they themselves.

Tell you do not feel a strange air when you enter a church.

Nothing more special than when I enter an art museum or a library.

Tell the Lord has never responded to ANY of your prayers.

I have noticed that it is when I take action to solve my problems that they stand the best chance of being solved. I have not noticed that prayer had ever increased those odds. Sometimes it decreased them, if I took no action and figured that God would take care of the problem.

If you are so sure God does not exist, open your mind and pray. Bring all you thoughts and feelings before, including you doubts and worrys, including thoughts you feel are wrong or shameful. Then wait. If you really do not feel a special presence, then maybe you have your "proof" that God doesn't exist.

I've done this many times. I never felt "a special presence", period.

 

[spirit1st]

Some have reject GOD.And feel nothing.No love no real feelings .just living ,looking for there place to fall.
trying to be like others .but not really alive!
Because without LOVE and mercy.We are nothing.But a shell walking around ,trying to look normal!
But lost .There are many like this .The jails and nut houses are full of these kind.
Blind beings.Very sad ,but true!
Once we lose our feeling of right and wrong.Which is really?THE HOLY GHOST telling us.then we are indeed dead!

 

[Yusuf Evans]

I'm sorry to hear that. My experience is very different, but then I'm not merely an "atheist". I have a philosophy of life. Maybe that's what makes the difference.

What do you base this philsophy of life on?


I never feel a presence from anyone aside from they themselves.

It's not one in which a physical presence would be felt, but one of deep spiritual presence.

Nothing more special than when I enter an art museum or a library.

This maybe true, but you don't get the same kind of fellowship from a museum.

I have noticed that it is when I take action to solve my problems that they stand the best chance of being solved. I have not noticed that prayer had ever increased those odds. Sometimes it decreased them, if I took no action and figured that God would take care of the problem.

Praying is not asking then waiting on the Lord. When you pray for something, or for help with something, you still do what you need to do. However, you have faith that the Lord is going to help you. That faith has brought the Lord to assist you.

 

[ACougar]

Wow, this kind of dehumanization is scary, just because someone rejects your religious beliefs you believe they are no longer fully human, incapable of love and other feelings?

I feel the Love of the Divine Goddess, and I hear Her voice and feel her compassion for all things. I ask that you wake up, that the scales fall from your eyes and that you understand that Gods love is everywhere, and in all things. We can not become seperated from it. The jails and "nuthouses" are full of sick people, people who need our love and compassion.

Some have reject GOD.And feel nothing.No love no real feelings .just living ,looking for there place to fall.
trying to be like others .but not really alive!
Because without LOVE and mercy.We are nothing.But a shell walking around ,trying to look normal!
But lost .There are many like this .The jails and nut houses are full of these kind.
Blind beings.Very sad ,but true!
Once we lose our feeling of right and wrong.Which is really?THE HOLY GHOST telling us.then we are indeed dead!

 

[MQTA]

I don't understand this Rejecting thing

 

[MQTA]

I see people saying reject this and reject that, and most people considered to be rejecting it seem have studied it, used to believe it, and know EXACTLY, if not MORE, of what they believe, having been there to start.

YET -- THEY reject everything else anyone says --- without ever Checking It Out. They just reject it based on the name of a site, or the title of an idea, and have what seems to be a standard taught or typical misunderstanding of what they think they do know of it.

It's so strange.. they're most guilty of what they finger point at anyone who has any other idea than them, who may have studied 100 things to their ONE, INCLUDING THEIR >one<!

 

[spirit1st]

No GODS LOVE IS NOT IN EVERYTHING.HE IS LOVE!But AS YOU DO?MOST REJECT HIS LOVE.BEC AUSE,HE SAYS?IF WE LOVED HIM?WE WOULD OBEY HIM!BUt many just think?they have a better way!
NOT KNOWING there end is DEATH.Not real death.but a never ending death.The lake of fire.
Peole are funny?Saying they knew GOD,but rejected HIm.They never knew GOD!But may have went to a place,called a church.may even have done some work there?
ONCE we KNOW HIM.NOTHING IN LIFE WILL DO!
Because?we were made by HIm ,for HIM.No other reason for us here.Of course we love our familys and friends.But once our relationshipwith HIm is gone.WE HAVE NOTHING.But just waiting for our place to drop!

 

[ACougar]

Let us reason together for a moment.


You claim that a God of Love, who granted us wisdom and discernment and responsibility for our eternal Soul would not want us to use that Wisdom and Discernment to choose the path that brings us closer to the Divine? Forsaking the path which seems best for another path out of fear or blind obediance? This is not reasonable.

Imagine leaving your 14 year old child alone in the house with a letter of instruction, the letter gives detailed instructions for the child. No Loud Music, Wash the Dishes, and turn the oven on to 350 degrees at 4PM for exactly 2 hours because there is a roast in the oven and you'll be home sometime after 7PM.

Now imagine all of a sudden another 50 notes with slightly differant instructions are left around the house. Thier all supposedly from you the parent, however there are all slightly differant. One states that the teen should set the oven to 400 degrees, another that Loud Music is permited, just make sure all the dooors and windows are closed.

The teen has only one choice, and that is to review as many letters as he can find and to do what seems most right to them. So it is with us, were presented with an unlimited choice of religions, all we can do is attempt to understand them as best we can and go with the one that seems most right to us.

For some people, like myself, that means we wind up choosing a religious path outside of Christianity. If the Parent is a good and loving Parent I have to believe that they will accept our best choice even if it isn't exactly what they would have wanted from us. It also means that they will accept your best choice even if it isn't what they wouldn't have wanted from you. You say that your understanding of God is that God is Love, I tell you that if the Divine refused to accept our best effort that they would not be Love and therefor not be God.

 

[MQTA]

whatta headspinner

 

[spirit1st]

Mat 27:3 Then Judas, which had betrayed him, when he saw that he was condemned, repented himself, and brought again the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and elders,
Mat 27:4 Saying, I have sinned in that I have betrayed the innocent blood. And they said, What is that to us? see thou to that.
Mat 27:5 And he cast down the pieces of silver in the temple, and departed, and went and hanged himself.

This is the only guy,I know of to walk with JESUS CHRIST and then ,turn his back on him.

 

[MQTA]

[bible]acts 1:18[/bible]

 

[Eudaimonist]

What do you base this philsophy of life on?

That would take some time to explain. You might have to make your question more specific if you want a specific answer. The briefest reply is that I base my philosophy of life on a philosophical consideration of what is good for human individuals, given their nature as living rational beings with complex psychologies.


I never feel a presence from anyone aside from they themselves.

It's not one in which a physical presence would be felt, but one of deep spiritual presence.

Yes, I understood that. When other people are in the room, I do not simply feel their "physical presence" -- their bodies and the space they take up -- but also their presence of personality. If I am in a room with one other person, I feel the the presence of two persons -- mine and the other's. No more.


Nothing more special than when I enter an art museum or a library.

This maybe true, but you don't get the same kind of fellowship from a museum.

Very true. Which is why I'm a member of the Fellowship of Reason.

I'm simply noting that I do get special feelings from particular buildings, either because they have an interesting architecture, or are filled with art, or symbolize something (libraries symbolize learning).


Praying is not asking then waiting on the Lord. When you pray for something, or for help with something, you still do what you need to do. However, you have faith that the Lord is going to help you. That faith has brought the Lord to assist you.

Yes, but I have done just as well in the doing, without the faith aspect.



I didn't really need any hugs and prayers, but thanks. You may have a hug if you need one, and I hope in a benevolent way for your eventual rational enlightenment.

 

[ClementofRome]

Here is a very humble and honest question that I would like for those who have "deconverted" to answer. I would like as honest an anwser from you and possible:

Prior to your deconversion, were you truly a Christian?

It appears to me that to reject Christianity as false would be to have never truly been a believer to begin with as that thing in which you supposedly believed does not exist. Therefore, it cannot be "deconversion" but simply the epistemological recognition that one thing is false and another thing is true.

Help me out here. Thanks.

 

[Grizzly]

Here is a very humble and honest question that I would like for those who have "deconverted" to answer. I would like as honest an anwser from you and possible:

Prior to your deconversion, were you truly a Christian?

It appears to me that to reject Christianity as false would be to have never truly been a believer to begin with as that thing in which you supposedly believed does not exist. Therefore, it cannot be "deconversion" but simply the epistemological recognition that one thing is false and another thing is true.

Help me out here. Thanks.

I have tried to explain this a couple of times in the past, and I admit that many Christians still have difficulty understanding.

The closest thing I can describe it to is the belief in Santa Claus. Many of us were true believers in Santa (maybe you were too at one time). But I believed in Santa as strongly as any child. The evidence for the existence of Santa was overwhelming. Presents arrived at the prophesied time, and somehow he always knew what we wanted.

But as I grew older, cracks in the story grew. How can he get to every house in one night? How did he get into our house (we didn't have a chimney). The final straw occured one Christmas when we threw carrots on the roof of the house for the reindeer to eat (my brother and I didn't tell mom and dad about it). When we checked to see if the carrots were gone, we saw they were still there, laying on the snow covered roof. Then we realized there were no sleigh tracks on the roof either. We confronted our parents and they spilled the beans.

So, back to the point. Did we believe in Santa? We sure did. Does our lack of belief in Santa negate the fact that we believed at one time? No, I don't believe it does.

 

[ClementofRome]

Thanks for the response. I appreciate it.

Clem

 

[Grizzly]

Thanks for the response. I appreciate it.

Clem

I don't know if that helps or not. Many Christians believe that because the Bible says that once your a follower, you will always be a follower (I can't remember the exact passage, so please forgive me) that it means that those of us who have rejected their faith must have never been Christians in the first place. I can't really speak to that, but I can tell you that my 20+ years as a Christian sure felt real to me...

 

[Cat59]

Here is a very humble and honest question that I would like for those who have "deconverted" to answer. I would like as honest an anwser from you and possible:

Prior to your deconversion, were you truly a Christian?

It appears to me that to reject Christianity as false would be to have never truly been a believer to begin with as that thing in which you supposedly believed does not exist. Therefore, it cannot be "deconversion" but simply the epistemological recognition that one thing is false and another thing is true.

Help me out here. Thanks.

I'm going to virtually reiterate something I said earlier in this thread.I can see what you are saying. I would say that if you examined a Christian in minute detail- their thoughts, beliefs, attitude, prayer life, and their intimate view of their personal relationship with Jesus and compared it with the people who are posting on this thread when they were calling themselves Christian you would find no difference. At that point in time, I believed, as you did, even though I now think what I was believing in was not true.
And as someone who does not believe in Jesus anymore, I have experienced a great loss, because whatever you say cannot undo the fact that my beliefs, my relationship I thought I had with God was genuine, full of meaning and the be all and end all of my life.
The loss of that belief was for me one of the most painful things I have experienced and went way beyond an epistemological recognition that one thing is false and another thing is true.
But I'm adjusting and I have now to see the world in another way and it's not as hopeless as I thought it would be.

 

[ClementofRome]

I don't know if that helps or not. Many Christians believe that because the Bible says that once your a follower, you will always be a follower (I can't remember the exact passage, so please forgive me) that it means that those of us who have rejected their faith must have never been Christians in the first place. I can't really speak to that, but I can tell you that my 20+ years as a Christian sure felt real to me...

Thanks. I wasn't really pressing for the "once saved, always saved" reaction, but in the back of my mind, I may have been thinking that. I am not questioning your "felt" experience, please understand. I am trying to get my mind around the paradigm shift that takes/took place when one who believes that they are a Christian, comes to believe something different.

Clem

 

[ClementofRome]

I'm going to virtually reiterate something I said earlier in this thread.I can see what you are saying. I would say that if you examined a Christian in minute detail- their thoughts, beliefs, attitude, prayer life, and their intimate view of their personal relationship with Jesus and compared it with the people who are posting on this thread when they were calling themselves Christian you would find no difference. At that point in time, I believed, as you did, even though I now think what I was believing in was not true.
And as someone who does not believe in Jesus anymore, I have experienced a great loss, because whatever you say cannot undo the fact that my beliefs, my relationship I thought I had with God was genuine, full of meaning and the be all and end all of my life.
The loss of that belief was for me one of the most painful things I have experienced and went way beyond an epistemological recognition that one thing is false and another thing is true.
But I'm adjusting and I have now to see the world in another way and it's not as hopeless as I thought it would be.

I did not mean to belittle your worldview crisis by simply terming it an epistemological shift. I dare say that it was very difficult. My task is to try to understand the heart-felt/head-oriented conviction toward God/Christ in the period leading up to the "de-conversion." Grizzly used the Santa analogy above and I am not quite sure that this is an appropriate analogy because we all believe what we are told until we reach a point of accountability where our thoughts become our own. If my father had told me at the age of 4 that the moon was made of green cheese, I surely would have believed him.....so this sort of unquestioning "faith" in the untrue is a part of childhood, but the analogy breaks down at some point in time. So, once one is well past the age of accountability and one professes with their mouth and believes in their heart that Jesus is Lord....what then, is the process of unbelief?

I hope you and Grizzly see that I am being serious with this line of questioning and no ill will is meant.

Clem

 

[Cat59]

That paradigm shift for me happened in a moment. I was driving to work with all the doubts and difficulties flying round my mind, looked up in the sky and realised I just didn't believe there was anything there but sky any more.
It was as if the world shifted, as though everything that had been out of focus suddenly came back into focus sharply defined. Everything fell into to place, all the doubts I'd had, all the conflicts disappeared but all I was left with at that point was a huge hole in my life that someone had just ripped into me. But the dissonance that I had felt through trying to believe something that I always had alongside the new information I had aquired disappeared.
It was that new information that I'd aquired that led to that shift, if I'd left well enough alone and not searched out of a sense of deepening my faith, I guess, I'd still be where I was six months ago.