In the Confessional: How I Became An Atheist

The rain beat down harshly on the mock stain glass windows, catching random worshippers unawares as they hastily flocked inside the long, lean building. Upon entrance I was met by a portly man in a grey suit, beaming from ear to ear whilst offering a firm handshake and a hymn book simultaneously. “God bless you” he purred and ushered me into the main auditorium to take my seat alongside the rest of the herd; mixed together, shaking hands, musing over weekly events and creating a low drone of sound.

I took my seat and placed my bible to my right and my hymn book to my left carefully avoiding any disturbance to my neighbour, bent forward, eyes closed and hands clenched in a moment of prayer. The arena hushed and the evangelical preacher marched forth, arms outstretched welcoming the responsive flock of sheep sitting eager for the word. “Let us not be afraid to speak the words of the gospel and proclaim the lord as our saviour” he bellowed, his lead was met with a cacophony of cheers, a frenzied hollering from the back to the front as arms flailed and voices broke into strange dialects. I reclined into my wooden pew and sighed, this was the moment, this was it I had seen the light. On that day at that time and in that place…I became an atheist.

My journey had taken me to a pivotal point via some strange twists and turns. I had been attending this particular church for over a year, and while unconvinced by the message, it had offered me a strange comfort, week by week. Could now be the time to renounce my faith? I hasten to add the word “faith” is implied without any great conviction, unlike my fellow brethren I found it hard to proclaim the lord as my personal saviour and had always harboured strong doubts without ever giving them serious thought. The idea of Christian fellowship had appealed to me, as a social group I had grown to enjoy the company of these people, but I could never commit to their god. It was time to stand up and be counted, to stop sitting on the fence and realise that theism just wasn’t for me, after months of careful deliberation I left and never returned.

When searching for a concise description of the word atheist, my pocket dictionary offers me the following: “belief in the non-existence of god” or “as a belief that god does not exist”. Derived from the Greek word atheos which translates roughly as “without god”, this one word continues to hold a controversial role in a modern society. Firstly, I am at pains to point out that an atheist is not –as some people assume or deliberately cast- a translation for devil worshipper or any general doer of evil. Even though religion has steadily worn down over time and appears to be on the way out, some observers claim that a proper lack of education and critical thinking skills will likely keep religion around for a good while longer yet. As indoctrination continues to be a strong “recruiting ground” for Christianity – particularly from one family generation to another – the church insists a revival is imminent; but then again hasn’t Jesus’ return been imminent for so many thousand years?

It may sound somewhat bitter and borderline hypocritical for someone once attending church to wish for its downfall, but it comes to a point when an institution is doing so much harm as much as good that it needs to be put out of its misery. One wonders what Jesus himself would think, were he to return to earth and see so many fallacies being preached and causes being mounted in his name; often totally contradicting the teachings he himself put in place via scripture.