Mine was probably when I relapsed towards religion at age 15-16 and joined my mom’s conservative megachurch, naïvely thinking I can convince them to be less bigoted and more “christ-like” as well as accept science
Mine was probably when I relapsed towards religion at age 15-16 and joined my mom’s conservative megachurch, naïvely thinking I can convince them to be less bigoted and more “christ-like” as well as accept science
Annoying atheist who tried to argue with religious people with Facts and Logic.
Same. At some point I became friends with pretty religious people who were also some of the most intelligent and nice people I had met. My beliefs that religious people are just dumb people who cannot understand the complexity of the real world kinda fell apart then.
I returned back to my pre-teen opinion, still an atheist but with compassion for other people’s beliefs. No need to constantly force my opinion into it or needlessly be a dick because we disagree. I’ve had many interesting discussions since then with very religious people. I still don’t fully get it, and to me it still reeks of indoctrination, but I’ve accepted that it’s fine to disagree.
Did you become religious again or just a less annoying atheist?
The latter
Not Op but atheist who accepts that some people would actually be unhappy without religion.
Honestly sometimes I wish I could brainwash myself that effectively.
Joining the “not op” train since I have a different answer than the others: I was peak annoying/edgy “debate bro” atheist and I ultimately became religious again but for a different religion.
Can elaborate if you want, I just don’t want to risk going on an unprovoked tangent lol.
tangent away mate
Not OP, but also an annoying adolescent atheist. After actually giving it some thought, I realized I was contextualizing the concept all wrong. Just because most people seem to contextualize God as a Santa Claus figure (bearded man who lives above us and judges our conduct, with fitting consequences) didn’t mean I had to accept that context.
There have been many very intelligent people across history who had many interesting things to say about deity. Few of them were using the Santa Claus model.
Not OP, but coming from the same place: less annoying (I hope!) atheist.
oh lol. been there done that. finally learnt it’s never worth your time to try and change someone’s beliefs.