Ex-Atheist Thread - O Come, All Ye Faithful Edition

Explain what make you change your mind about faith, and how you fell for the college New Atheism meme.

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I.changed my mind because I am a gullible, shallow moron who changes my beliefs to impress people, like a vapid celebrity making a fashion statement.

He's not even the best Hitchens.

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What happened to your post m8?
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I fell for the New Atheism meme. I read Christopher Hitchens, Dawkins, and Harris.
Then I just woke up one day.
I'm still not religious, but I'm sad that religion is declining because of the rise of degeneracy.

I never fault people for believing in God or praying.

>I never fault people for believing in God or praying.
Because everytime the church is in a position of power things get better, right?

...

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Dont understand how you can go from atheist to believer of that sort of non sense desu

...

Studying Superstring theory.

You can do it for the idea of the usefulness of christianity as a moral focal point to stop things like cultural relativism, or to have a set of values that people internalize so you don't need the government to enforce them for instance.

Explain the relevance.

But actually believing adam eve, noah, the resurrection?

I'm still agnostic on the god thing since I've only been thinking about this since the refugee crisis. But I'm culturally christian and it's because I realised "universal values" are just a meme.

In hindsight atheism is sold as the abandonment of faith and the acceptance of science. But practically a lot of the stupid people who would have been kept productive by the religion thing just turn into idiots worshipping at their shrine of marxism getting sermons from professors instead of priests. So also I figured if I'm nominally Christian and successful, stuff will click with these and stop giving insane leftism a bigger base.

And at the end of the day, also just realising le ebul christianity was always just a bad meme

Sorry I'll do it for him

Was raised an "atheist" (was really just never told about religion) and I don't quite understand the concept of god. It makes absolutely no sense to me and believe me, I've tried to understand it.

I do think it gives a unique sense of community though, and there is definitely beauty behind religion. I visited a Catholic church on a visit to Philadelphia with a friend and it was an interesting experience. Very beautiful architecture and amazing atmosphere.

Never was atheist. Mainly because when I think about it it seems to me that becoming atheistic would leave me with no reason to care about anything.

>People praying means that the church is in a position of power
>Literally what

What don't you understand about the concept of God? The Trinity (3 persons, 1 God thing)?

...

You want a starting place for Christianity in practice, try Matthew 6.

>Explain what make you change your mind about faith

When I saw there was nothing to replace it with in society. Which gave rise to far leftism and communism.

Still can't genuinely believe in theism but support Christianity and it's symbolism.

PS: remove kebab.

Many people do not like the idea that they live an ultimately meaningless existence and would rather believe that there is some kind of high power/existence we cannot fully understand. Especially when there's this fascinating ancient collection of writings describing such a thing.

>Many people do not like the idea that they live an ultimately meaningless existence

I realize I just speak for myself, but I find it more fascinating and motivating to find answers in that case. Which is why I love science.

However, I don't rule out a higher power or plane of existence, because I don't know if there is or not. I just currently reject the notion of it due to lack of evidence.

The idea of it though, that there could be other dimensions or universes, absolutely fascinates me. Which is why I am always open to it should evidence ever be presented.

The Bible is Judaized ancient Mediterranean, and Persian wisdom. The Bible re-writes ancient history to put Jews at the center of civilization. Belief in the bible makes one into a slave to the Jew. Christianity was promoted to topple the Roman Empire after Jews were butthurt about their rebellion getting crushed. (((Christians))) care more about the fate of Israel, and the Jews than their own children.

I don't quite understand what god IS. I've read the entire bible and from the beginning, it just seems to assume the reader knows what god is supposed to be. From what I do understand, god is an omnipotent being which is sometimes a whole to some people (Protestants) and sometimes a trinity (Catholics) to others. In which case, why worship three beings if you're only supposed to worship one according to the ten commandments?

Not only that, I don't understand why an omnipotent god would allow evil to occur. Why not just fix the problem? God seems like kind of an asshole throughout the entire Old Testament. To me, it seems incredibly unreasonable to eternally punish the human race for the misdoings of two people.

There is none. Christfag zombies like to play 2 smart 4 U.

Germany will be majority non-white before America because of your current immigration policies

Enjoy that

Talking to an atheist is like talking to an anarchist, for all the same reasons and arguments. Just replace God with Government and you get a direct parallel.

If you ultimately think everything Christianity believes and practices is as close to correct as anyone has come, but have a hard time accepting the supernatural aspects, that's the same leap of faith everyone has. Eventually you come to that point no matter what you interrupt the world around you to be, unless you're just apathetic about finding any truth. I don't have a piece of paper I can point to and show people "this is the right answer", that's not how this one works, it's ultimately a choice. And given the choices, it's by far the best and most reasonable option in my opinion.

But I already give to charity and I never brag about it. I don't understand why people need to have an incentive in the form of a reward from god in order to give to the needy. For me, the reward for giving to charity is intrinsic to the act. Just makes me feel good as a person knowing that I helped a person out.

And anyone who argues Christian societies, historically, haven't been the most prosperous is a fucking liar.

>Trinity

>Problem of Evil
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Even atheists don't find this convincing
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Heh. Matt Dillahunty.

This is a good one for people to understand too because it gets mis-used a lot, especially by Christians who would rather knee-jerk react to the statement "God is Dead" without understanding the context enough to prove their own point.

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You should look at trends for your religion, m8.
It's not looking good.

Seriously, why the fuck should anyone care?
I never understood that about this board. I'm atheist. Big deal. Some people think there's some bullshit magic at work, I don't. Is that a reason to fight? No one would even care if both the "Ur going to hell you degenerate scum" and "le meme magic man fairy tales lel all I need is my own intelligence" would shut the fuck up about it.

I became spiritual 5 years ago due to growing up, now I follow KEK, as I believe it is the most personally rewarding religious experience.

Praise KEK

Fell for the meme similarly to I always took religious teachings/lore with a grain of salt. (Different times, language evolution, context interpretation etc.) Some good and bad in everything, right? Atheism helped me cast away the "God" I was taught. And in that freedom (Bless this Land) I was enabled the opportunity to effectively learn spirituality on my own terms. I think some people would still call me an atheist because of how I would define god; using a simile to equate the universe with a CPU or some other machination of man. Sagan might say I'm just seeing patterns in my boiling water. But I accept that ignorance with an eagerness to be proven wrong. As a man who values science, I hold faith in that ignorance. Could we define god as 'an ever receding pocket of scientific ignorance' sure if you want to be a smarmy dick about it. Some people will cling desperately to the tales of yore out of fear or ignorance. Whether right or wrong, they do. We don't feel atoms bond, but they do. And though you may not feel "his" presence, in this moment you feel mine. We are of god. God surrounds us, and binds us. Luminous beings we are, not this crude matter. You must feel god around you; here, between you, me, the tree, the rock, everywhere.

Nice trips

>rare flag, at least I think so, cool
Arguments about politics and religion are the most passion fueled ones you'll ever have. You don't have to binge on them if you don't want to, but it matters because it touches so many aspects of life.

Ex-atheist? You were just a hormonal shithead who wanted to rebel against his parents.

If you had good cognitive abilities and analyzed the empirical evidence for God, you'd realize that he is in the same category as pixies, genies, and fairies.

In other words, he most likely doesn't exist.

The basic fact that God is real.

And even if He wasn't, you'd still be far better of just pretending.

>coming to a different conclusion
>thinking for yourself
wew lad, must be pixies or something.

At least Muslims kill their apostates, Atheists just snark theirs to boredom.

>thinks killing is the superior option

Spoken like a true religionfag.

I bet that made you feel very enlightened.

>how you fell for the college New Atheism meme.

Literally watching edgy atheist youtube videos nonstop since when I was 16

>Explain what make you change your mind about faith,

Always had a off feeling about being a New Atheist. Realised only a few years ago that I was being exactly as dogmatic as I thought all religious people were

If anyone wants to come to Christ, reply to this post

If someone believed in Santa, wouldn't you give them shit? There is as much proof for Santa as there is Christianity.

Imagine!

...

fuck

a world without religion

Religion isn't about proof, it's about having faith in a set of moral principles which guide your life

There only a few epistemological claims that need faith in order for those moral principles to gain absolute legitimacy

Stanta is not nearly as comprehensive so as to act as a religious leader

I have nothing wrong atheists, but being anti-theist is a whole different ideology. You've let it slip you don't trust any religions in your country at all, I don't know where the fuck you're getting this high and mighty attitude from.
You don't make any counter arguments to my logic, just dismiss it as conjecture. You're the equivalent of a liberal who thinks everyone is just spreading conspiracies on the right wing.
If you want to argue that what I say is conjecture, without providing logical counter arguments at all, I don't see a reason why I should care about your opinion. Anti-theism has never been a majority. I am telling you what will happen if it does. You call it conjecture. Then you accuse me of hating atheism, which I never said I did. This whole fucking time you just put things in my mouth, or talk shit like you know better, when you don't even know what caused the crusades, yet you have no problem throwing it around as a crime of religion, despite it being motivated by belligerence on behalf of Islamic peoples conquering the lands of the Christian Europeans.

The tyranny of the majority is an existing fact. Maybe a stretch for you to imagine, but wasn't for Alexis De Tocqueville who wrote 1100+ page book on Democracy in America, in which he predicted most of the social issues we're having today, 200 years ago. His book is highly respected and encouraged reading for anyone getting into politics.
The tyranny of the majority is a real and constant threat, all it takes is some extremism. That is what we are potentially facing in the near future, and why I support Trump and the alt-right, to STOP tyrannical liberalism. And I will continue to take the side of liberty over tyrannical majorities that want to restrict freedoms unjustly. If there was a major christian majority, that gave them the ability to ignore the minority group, they would start enforcing all kinds of christian laws. If anti theists got it, they would enforce anti-theist laws. If tolerant atheists have it, they will not care, but all it takes is some belligerence from the opposition to start converting atheists into anti-theists. This is not complicated political science.

A religious guy said that my faith was false. After getting over the butthurt associated with it, I thought about what he said, and realized he was right.

Henceforth I was an atheist.

And there's literally no reason to strictly adhere to the rules made up by ancient Palestinians.

There are some basic morals that people follow because of our genetics, and then the rest is cultural, some individual. No need for this story or the pageantry.

It's easy if you try!

There is a need, because without it all you have is individualism: comprising of """rational""" egoism, hedonism and utilitarianism

There are no cohesive morals in a society which doesn't value any form of cultural collectivism

All we're left is: "just do what you fell like and/ or think is right"

I used to be the type of atheist, but over time I pretty much went off all this militant atheist stuff after realising how ironic it was that I lambasted religious people for spreading their religion, while trying to do the exact same thing.
Then after a while I realised that there was no way to prove nor disprove the existence of God, and I became agnostic. Finally, last Wednesday I was feeling really pessimistic about the chances for Brexit, so I decided that I may as well try a prayer, and after witnessing the storms in major Remain areas, the sun on the day after, and the surprise win for Leave, I've made my mind up to become Anglican. It may be a stupid reason, but to me it's as good a reason as any.

>fell for the meme

This implies that I was born believing in God and someone had to convince me he wasn't real.

My parents never told me about God or took me to church. By the time I was an adult, there was just no reason to believe that some dude was killed and raised from the dead or turned water into wine, or that death is just a temporary transition into paradise, or any of the other many unsubstantiated and totally extraordinary claims made by religion.

It didn't hurt that there were more than one religion, all claiming completely different and completely contradictory things.

It didn't hurt that there were old dead religions, and knowing that people used to sincerely believe in those and were completely wrong.

The list goes on and on but at its core, it's quite simple. Stories that contain magic, monsters, demons, fairies, and things like that are always fake... oh, except for this one. Yea, no.

>There are no cohesive morals in a society which doesn't value any form of cultural collectivism

Interesting, all the collectivists I've met have been non-religious, certainly not christian.

>comprising of """rational""" egoism, hedonism and utilitarianism

Bullshit, people have morals that aren't self centered.

>All we're left is: "just do what you fell like and/ or think is right"

And? It works out pretty well.

Your scepticism is not a rebuttal, señor user

Just because something can be wrong, doesn't mean it is

You're just trying to ridicule what doesn't appeal to common sense

>(see argument from ridicule)

Religious people are so cucked that they literally devote their lives to ancient tales of desert niggers and goat herders which they believe because they can FEEEEL it and they KNOOOOW it's true!

Pathetic retards.

>Bullshit, people have morals that aren't self centered.

Non-religious/ non-spiritual Westerners?

Give examples

>And? It works out pretty well.

There's too much volatility and difference of opinion in that. The laws in our countries for example are largely a residual remnant from our culturally collectivist Christian past

The only reason the perspective on those laws is not violently splintering apart, is because Christianity has been replaced with different ideologies (largely social and classical liberal views on the law)

But, with cultural (not social) liberalism, this threatens to change

>inb4 fat man hat memes

What he said is called an ad hominem user

Do you not know any people? Almost everyone I know has a set of moral guidelines that they follow which is "Don't be a dick, be nice" and almost none of them are religious.

There really isn't much difference of opinion, almost everyone I know gets "don't be a dick". It's also policed by the majority of people who will punish people for being dicks.

Societies worked fine before christianity and without Christianity.

The question was why I fell for the atheist meme, not "how do you know God isn't real"? I'm saying I didn't fall for anything because I was never under the impression that God was real in the first place.

Furthermore, I'm not arguing that God isn't real. He could be real. You could be God, for all I know. I don't have access to all the secrets of the universe.

BUT I don't go around believing EVERYTHING I can't confirm as false is true. If that were the case, I'd believe in all sorts of ridiculous shit.

You can't confirm that there's no such thing as NBA fairies, little invisible creatures that fly around basketball courts in the NBA and help certain player's shots go in.

So tell me, user? Why did you fall for that stupid meme that NBA fairies don't exist? Do you think it makes you smarter and more superior to not believe in NBA fairies?

>give examples

Top kek. Give examples of Christians with morals.

You'll see how futile and retarded this exercise is, for both sides.

>he thinks a valid argument becaomes an ad hominem if you add insults

Wew

Let's not forget that the majority of African Americans identify as Christian, yet most of them, particularly the men, are violent thieves who deteriorate society.

Before Christianity there were pagan religions in Europe

A culturally atheistic *and* irreligious Europe/ West is a very recent development:
About around the time Nietzsche said "God has been killed by the people who stopped believing in Him"

On your other point, do you really think everyone considers "not being a dick" in virtually the same way, and in nearly all moral questions? Intuitively, just like what?

Why?

>xd dae le KEKS
>a valid argument
10/10 made me have thoughts

You really need to start attacking the arguments, and leave whomever is making those arguments out of the question

It doesn't matter who says the argument

Exactly, whether someone is a christian or not is not what determines if they're moral.

>On your other point, do you really think everyone considers "not being a dick" in virtually the same way, and in nearly all moral questions? Intuitively, just like what?
>Why?

Do you have autism? People generally learn how to coexist with eachother when they interact. Don't be selfish or confrontational basically. It's really not hard.

Le Atheist Hat meme completely destroyed atheism.

Memes are crazy powerful.

Both of you are idiots and missing his point.

>they literally devote their lives to ancient tales of desert niggers and goat herders which they believe because they can FEEEEL it and they KNOOOOW it's true!

That is a perfectly valid point against cuckstianity.

>BUT I don't go around believing EVERYTHING I can't confirm as false is true.

So why do you go around believing everything that could be true as false?

Absence of evidence is never evidence of absence

You can only say I don't know, and that's all

Here is a question of faith, not evidence (when you can't in any way confirm its truth or falsity)

the fact the private school i went to pretty much hated anyone that wasn't southern baptist like themselves, we were even told to attempt "converting" other christians

that in itself fucked my head up

then i remember being a little kid and hearing that one story soemthing like this

>*jesus hits bong*
>bruh i need you to go kill your kid
but lord i..
>JUST DO IT FAGGOT, DONT YOU BELIEVE IN ME?
>sets up kid on sacrificial rock
>ties him down
>grabs knife
>kid starts to cry
>SHIIIIT NIGGA I WAS JUST KIDDING
>here go kill this goat instead
>teacher: god works in mysterious ways :^)


i got detention that day for making the class laugh with the only remark i could have thought "god is a dick"

and also for the remark "why is god so vain?" when told we were made in his image.


and thats pretty much when i lost faith when i was like 10

>Don't be selfish

Not a Western contemporary value

>or confrontational

Exclusively a Western contemporary value

Also, you'd more than this thumb role to establish the ethics and moral direction of a whole country

People really need to understand what an ad hominem is.

"You're a nigger," is not an ad hominem. That's just an insult. No argument was made.

"You argument is wrong because you're a nigger." That is an ad hominem. An argument was made and the premise for that argument was some characteristic of the opposing speaker.

An ad hominem requires some attempt to rebutt the argument being made, which can make it a subtle difference.

If you say, "2 + 2 = 5" and I say, "2 + 2 = 4, you fat kike." There's no ad hominem. I rebutted your argument and then insulted you.

If you say, "2 + 2 = 5" and I say, "There's no way a fat kike like this understands math and therefore 2 + 2 can't possibly = 5", I did an ad hominem.

Nope. It's just mockery

LITERALLY a strawman

>Not a Western contemporary value

Yes it is. You clearly don't have friends or go out. People don't like selfish people, it's basic group behavior.

If god exists and can do anything can he create a rock he cannot lift?

Are you fucking retarded? Santa Claus was a real human. You fucking imbecile

No a scarecrow is literally a strawman, he had a good argument.

Right and so was jesus, but neither were magic. Take your meds buddy, calm down.

I'm not a Westerner so I notice the difference in individualism between the cultural blocks

You have lower standards for selfish (greedy, hedonistic, and self-indulgent) behaviour

You may feel that it's mocking, and it very well may be, but my argument still stand even if it hurts your feelings. That kind of belief is irrational and idiotic and if you devote your life to such beliefs you are cucked on a level that can't even be achieved by sucking Ahmed's cum out of your daughter's asshole.
>a fucking swede
kek

Reporting in.

I'm still practically an atheist, but I believe in determinism and the fact that no one really has control over anything, the universe just does what it does when it wants to, and we all live in an unbreakable chain of events.

I feel the same way about this than for example Christians feel about their god doing things you cannot affect.

I am just scared of the fact that nobody really knows for sure what happens after we die. I want to believe, but it's hard to make me convince myself.

>Religious people literally devote their lives to ancient tales of desert niggers and goat herders which they believe because they can FEEEEL it and they KNOOOOW it's true!

Religious people do X because they """"believe"""" Y is true

Therefore Y is not true

How can an atheist become religious? Where did you get the proof for your belief suddenly?

Same, currently I believe in astrology bc gf is

belief
bJˈliːf/Submit
noun
1.
an acceptance that something exists or is true, especially one without proof.
"his belief in extraterrestrial life"
2.
trust, faith, or confidence in (someone or something).

Taking the barest, unamended definition, "an acceptance that something exists or is true", you have a positive acknowledgement of something's existence. It leads you to have confidence in the idea that "X is real" or "X exists".

It's one thing to recognize that something COULD exist and quite another to believe it DOES.

I recognize the possibility of a Godlike force in the universe. In fact, when you start from that barest of premises, I don't even view it as terribly unlikely. That deistic "first cause", "force of nature" is so removed from human comprehension that it would be pedestrian to scoff at it as though there were some frame of reference by which to accept or deny it.

But once the stories start getting more specific... human beings having interacted with said God, said God having certain rules for human beings, and certain expectations and demands, then I begin to have some rational basis upon which to compare my experience with the worldly realm to the claims being made by the religious and have a reasonable skepticism.

And more to the point, in the face of my skepticism, there's nothing but assertions of faith and trust and on and on, the kind of things that swindlers and snakeoil salesmen would say.

Therefore you need proof for Y pajeet

You don't really prove faith, you gain it through personal experiences

Proving faith is like taking the wetness out of water

You realise science is just meming, When 90 percent of the mass to make gravity equation balance is undetcleble.
But beyond that, science is based on the unrational belief that because we can't perceive things all at once, things like 'time' and 'cause and effect' exist.
Or just realise the Big Bang can't explain creation.

>the universe just does what it does when it wants to
The universe doesn't "want". It's not a conscious entity. To want implies desire which hasn't been demonstrated to be a property of the universe we live in.

Psychedelics.

Take the final pill, anons.

I never said anything about magic fuck tard. The statement you made previously made 0 fucking sense. Clarify it. Dumb nigger baby

"You gain faith through personal experiences" sounds supiciously like "the thing you believe is proved to you through various personal experiences".

So I suppose the question is what personal experiences did you have that confirmed, in your mind, that God was real? After all, you claim to have been an atheist, and it follows to reason you were an atheist in the first place precisely because you had an expectation of evidence.

SOME evidence must have presented itself to form the basis of your faith, no?