Dealing With the Shock: 07 November 2003
So, I left my faith about two weeks ago now. It was very emotional at first, I cried a lot and felt overwhelmed. My entire first week was one big panic attack. I was walking through the subway on one of the first few days and I remember looking around at all of the people and realising that most of them weren't Christians and that I wasn't the only one who didn't believe. Those first few days, I thought a lot about not having a "personal relationship with Jesus" and it felt very foreign to me. It's just always been there... and now I don't know what to call that. Sometimes the thought that God might not be there, or if he is there he might not be interested in me at all, was a very heavy one. I spent more time crying that week than in the last year. I couldn't call my parents. I am very close with them and I don't really want to break this news to them over the phone. Unfortunately, I'm not going to see them until Christmas break.
This week has been quieter. I have been getting used to the idea, and I've plowed through the first 'coming out' conversations, the ones that needed to happen now anyways. Most people were very supportive, and those who are Christians at least weren't judgemental. I think E. was the most judgemental, but now she wants to hang out with me more, which either means she wants to try to bring me back into the fold, or she feels like she hasn't been good enough 'community' to me, or she just suddenly realised that if I'm not going to be at church, we're going to have to schedule a time to see each other or drop out of each other's lives. I really hope it's the latter. I think she's going to be one of the harder ones to hang onto. I love that girl, but her entire life is consumed with Jesus stuff, I don't know if she even knows non-Christians here. Everything is "God will provide" and "I'll have to pray about it" and "come to my bible study" and "church was so great today". I don't know, that works for her, I just can't rig it anymore. That was totally my entire life six years ago.
Sometimes it feels like a failure. I mean, that's how I explain why I'm leaving, right? I say that I'm too tired. I say that I can't believe it anymore. I say that I tried to figure it out and now I'm giving up. I say that I've lost faith. I say that I just can't see it anymore. I say that I'm too skeptical, that I'm too critical. I say that I'm basically just a bastard who doesn't want things to work out, just wants to pick and pick until something starts bleeding.
I need to get to a point where I say that I'm not a Christian because it's not true. Right now, I can't say that. It gives me a pang of "what will they think". I feel like I must edit my thoughts to adjust to the party line.
Well, fuck that. One of the best parts of the last two weeks has been NOT editing myself. I can say so many things that I've been scarcely letting myself think all my life. I don't need to reconcile things like:
1. God is love.
2. Perfect love casts out fear.
3. Fear God.
Fear, respect, whatever, I've heard that line so many times I could spout that in my sleep. I don't care. Translate it better then. Tell me what the Hebrew/Greek says. Actually, don't, it's still a god that commands his people to rip open pregnant women, lest a single child survive the god-ordained genocide. I don't want to serve a god like that.
You know, quand j'étais p'tit, I remember hearing about native american myths that had flood stories in them, and greek myths or something that had similar myths (I didn't actually read them, that would be establishing a foothold for SATAN), and we always took this to confirm our flood story in Genesis. Well... maybe if we say that this story about a flood is a myth, and that story about a flood is a myth... why isn't the story that you heard all your life about a flood ALSO a myth?
There are so many things I don't know right now. I don't know what I think of Jesus. I don't know entirely what I think of all of the bible. I don't know whether there is a god. But, I don't need to know that just yet. Right now I'm sorting out just what it is that I don't believe. And I don't believe Christianity. Maybe someday I'll come back to some liberal form of it, but I'm done with the fundies.
I was reading a paper by James Moyer (on infidels.org) about recovering from fundamentalism, and part of it said, "The former believer may be very adept at meeting the perceived expectations of others through self denial. Denial, repression, splitting, and a false sense of self are often well developed defence mechanisms... repression of anything that might possibly be construed as unacceptable." This is totally true for me. How many times a day do I self-edit? I react to what people say on IRC or MSN and I have a response all typed up and I think "Woah. Am I allowed to say this? Am I missing something here? They all hate me, don't they? They'll kick me out if I say this!" or if it's MSN, I think, "Whoa, how do I know I'm talking to (the person I'm talking to)? What if I'm talking to (person I'm talking about, usually) and they've hacked the other person's MSN account and now they hate me??" I am super-paranoid some days. Maybe this is the first step in a process away from that.
· · · found elsewhere · · ·
Still debating on how to tell the parents. Q suggested that Christmas might not be an ideal time, but I'm not sure that I have any other options. I mean, either way, Christmas will be weird, whether I go there soon just to tell them, or go tell them right at Christmas. Will they think I'm going to hell? Will they think they're bad parents? What if they want out too and just haven't jumped? I think Dad is closer to that than Mom. I don't really want to push them there, I would mess up all their social stuff and it would be hard on A.
<--sooner · later-->
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