Agnosticism
Nov. 9th, 2012 07:31 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
tinhuvielartanisWhen I was a very young child, starting around the age of 4, my dream was to be a nun. I just wanted to go around singing to people and healing them, have a personal relationship with god, and wear a fashionable veil. That bubble was burst when I found out I wasn't Catholic. So I figured preacher might be a better fit anyway. That bubble was burst when I found out you had to have a winky before god would even look at you. I began to wonder if any of this was nothing more than bullshit. I remember hearing a Bible story where someone tested god's presence by leaving a dry clothe out at night. If it had no dew, it was proof that god existed. I could totally be getting this wrong. Whatever it was, I thought I could get my proof in the same manner. I placed a dry rag in the closet and prayed that, if god existed, it would be wet in the morning. I had all manner of faith that it would be wet.
I was wrong.
The next morning it was dry as could be. I was 7 and that was the morning I began to question the nature and existence of god. I wanted desperately to believe. Something about the myths and songs from various cultures always brought me a kind of peace. Science fiction began to fill a hole in my myth that god just could not anymore. Even when I discovered Witchcraft and felt the Divine Feminine for the first time in my life in 1989, it still wasn't completely enough for me to suspend all disbelief and give myself over to a higher or otherworldly presence.
When Aunt Tudi died, I encountered two people too busy with their church activities to help me deal with some issues. The screamed hypocrisy to me. It wasn't god's fault; rather, it was the flaw of people trying to follow in god's footsteps. What else could I say? But there was a part of me who resented it all. God had taken away my way of life. God had taken away my willingness to live. God had stirred a strong longing for human extinction within my breast. And those friends I though I had, they'd been transformed into Stepford Wives for Christ.
I've always considered myself a student of spirituality, an agnostic looking for a place near deity where I could finally rest and learn. I'm further from that place than ever before. For the first time in my life, I'm looking more logically at atheism than I ever did blind faith. When you stare into the dead eyes of the woman who raised you and you find no indication where she my have gone, if anywhere, atheism has a valid argument. When all the Hypo-Christians circle your broken spirit to get you in their church when you're at your most vulnerable, atheism looks like a lot sweeter deal.
I don't know that I believe anymore more. I don't know what I want to believe. I don't know if I want to believe anything at all anymore. And I'm too tired of all of it to be a good agnostic and seek for my place in the universe/
I was wrong.
The next morning it was dry as could be. I was 7 and that was the morning I began to question the nature and existence of god. I wanted desperately to believe. Something about the myths and songs from various cultures always brought me a kind of peace. Science fiction began to fill a hole in my myth that god just could not anymore. Even when I discovered Witchcraft and felt the Divine Feminine for the first time in my life in 1989, it still wasn't completely enough for me to suspend all disbelief and give myself over to a higher or otherworldly presence.
When Aunt Tudi died, I encountered two people too busy with their church activities to help me deal with some issues. The screamed hypocrisy to me. It wasn't god's fault; rather, it was the flaw of people trying to follow in god's footsteps. What else could I say? But there was a part of me who resented it all. God had taken away my way of life. God had taken away my willingness to live. God had stirred a strong longing for human extinction within my breast. And those friends I though I had, they'd been transformed into Stepford Wives for Christ.
I've always considered myself a student of spirituality, an agnostic looking for a place near deity where I could finally rest and learn. I'm further from that place than ever before. For the first time in my life, I'm looking more logically at atheism than I ever did blind faith. When you stare into the dead eyes of the woman who raised you and you find no indication where she my have gone, if anywhere, atheism has a valid argument. When all the Hypo-Christians circle your broken spirit to get you in their church when you're at your most vulnerable, atheism looks like a lot sweeter deal.
I don't know that I believe anymore more. I don't know what I want to believe. I don't know if I want to believe anything at all anymore. And I'm too tired of all of it to be a good agnostic and seek for my place in the universe/
no subject
Date: 2012-11-29 05:30 am (UTC)I know that sounds kind of flippant... but I've been browbeat by a number of christian-somethingorothers over the years and it really hasn't changed my attitude towards organized religion ("None for me, thanks"). I've learned to tune them out, smile and nod, and generally play the polite "that's nice dear" while being non-commital enough that they assume I share their beliefs. Social lubricant, for the most part. I don't normally bring up my lack of religion, because it's none of their business, really.