How Atheism Has Become a Part of My Life

Growing up, I was at first a Christian, a Baptist, coming from my mother's side. I mostly attended summer bible schools at the insistence of my mother, who didn't go to church because of my father, but after my parent's divorce met a Catholic man and converted shortly thereafter. My father's views on religion were odd and mostly unexplained; I overheard once in a conversation he had with an unfortunate pair of religious doorknockers that he had lost God in the war of Vietnam. In the end, facing death, he broke down and sought God; he was saved by a preacher who poured water on his head over his kitchen sink, as at that point he was confined to a wheelchair. In his last weeks, he listened to the Bible on CD's or audio cassette tapes, I don't remember which.

I was emotionally distraught at the time of his death, not only of the death itself but of what I perceived as my father's weakness. At that point I was an angry, confused young man, who despised religion just as my father had. Looking back, I see that my father had nothing else to turn to - his wife of over twenty years had just divorced him, and I, after receiving a tongue-lashing by him the day after my mother and I moved out, was bitter, angry and afraid, and stopped talking to him.

The anti-social, emotionally backwards shell that I had surrounded myself with was slowly chipped away I moved away from my father by friends, family and co-workers, and over time, I have come to think of myself in much better terms than I had used to, though still a little resentment is there. It took a while before I realized that the strong will of my father was still hanging over me, even after his death, and that I need not fear him anymore, and I was capable of making decisions on my life without his approval.

During this time of reawakening and confusion about my position and principles in life, I met the Chris that I mentioned in my first post, who showed me Buddhism. It was remarkable that I was able to find a set of principles with which I could guide my life, and that was not only rational in my mind, but was not tied to a religion. Up until a while ago, I was satisfied with using the guidings of Buddhism and being an atheist.

Then I met the love of my life, Trisha, who, in a discussion of religion brought up the idea that maybe I still was resenting the idea of religion because of my father. This may or may not be the case, as I'm not a psychoanalyst, but the importance of whether or not this is true has led me to question things. It's not that I suddenly believe that there might be a god, but I do not want to blind myself to something that might be there. I've questioned my faith before, and have hemmed and hawed between hopeful agnostic and hardened atheist most of my life.

The problem I have with faith is that can be influenced by your surroundings, allowing an innocent person to be tainted by being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Take my father - although I am not sure of how strong his faith was when he was a kid, he lived most of his life without religion because of his experiences in Vietnam. If he had not been drafted, my mother and father may had never met, and I would have never been conceived. Because of the luck of the draft, however, I was born and due to the circumstances leading up to now, I am an atheist. Because a parent is a major influence of a child's life, and if God does mettle with the everyday affairs of life, He not only made sure of my conception, but ensured the probability of my becoming an atheist was higher than not. Is it then entirely my fault that I will be cast into the fires of Hell? No. If God is the kind just to get things going and doesn't interfere with everyday life, the events that have occurred are still of His influence, not because He destined it to be but because he started the whole mess, and it still wouldn't be fair for me to punished. To use a poor euphemism, if God is the bowling ball and we are the pins, is our fault if we fall over? I don't have the strength of mind at the moment to make a better argument, and I'm sure it's full of holes, but for now, this is why I disagree with faith as a whole.