Atheism Has One Cost

The one cost of choosing to be an Atheist is, you have to give up your soul. And that usually happens gradually, as it did for me. From what I have read, this is typical. It slips away with little wisps of “faith”.

It’s a liberating feeling to lose all belief in a god. I know that for all my good and evil deeds, I have no chance for redemption, or consequence, in any afterlife. I will just end, like a good song. It will be up to people to remember me.

I know the devout will think I carry a lost soul, but in reality, that is already gone, always was. They think I will burn in hell, but there is no hell, just as there is no god or heaven.

How did I get here, to this place? A place that freaks out believers, but gives me strength they will never understand…

1972, at the age of 8, I was shuffled out of my home country, the US, 50 miles into Canada. A place my father frequented when he was young. All of the kids in my family were removed from a public school in western Detroit, to a Catholic school in Kingsville Ontario.

In Canada, I was actually an altar Boy, for three years. It was a good experience; I learned to not freak out in front of a crowd and to concentrate on the ceremony. We actually had fun, the priest was very cool.

We got to year four in Canada and one of us kids got disciplined on the first day of school. Mom appeared and pulled us all out, to go across town to the Public School. I liked the new school better, because the kids weren’t beaten or humiliated. Other kids were friendly and welcoming.

The next year, we moved back to Detroit, but no Churchin’ happened. I think my Dad went sometimes, but the rest of us kids dropped out. As far as I know, only one of five even attends occasionally.

As I grew up, I learned about all of the religions, on my own. Catholics were the most violent one, historically (wisp). Then the Ireland fiasco happened and I was sickened by Christianity in general (wisp). Then the stories of pedophile priests started (and have never ended) popping up (wisp). Then the cover-ups by the Bishops (wisp). The LRA and their insanity in Africa (wisp).

I got older and saw how religion perverted US Politics. I learned of how Thomas Jefferson penned; “"wall of separation between church and state" and the continual push to erode that separation. The branch dividian thing happened in Texas (wisp).

Religion = God = Murder or Rape = Evil. I think the only religion I have any respect for is Buddhism.

The deeds of man drove god out of my life. I can’t name the number of times I thought to myself, “This world is insane, good is dying. And god isn’t doing anything about it. God is making it worse.” Eventually, there was no god. And if you ask me who created the universe? I will answer, “Since you think everything needs a creator, then who created god? If you can’t answer that, I can. Man created god, not the other way around.”