The Agnosticats (Part 1)
I am an agnostic. Which is a half-assed way of not copping to be an atheist. I've never quite gotten to the point where I want to take on that label. Hedging my bets?
My parents are non-practicing Catholics. They had me baptized, then did me the favor of never, ever bringing me back to church. We had Bibles in the house, and the usual assortment of religious icons. And a stack of Playboys. Guess which one had more of a hand in shaping my morality?
They never encouraged nor discouraged religion. As a teen, I decided that I wanted to start going to church. But Catholicism was not really an option. That was like trying to walk on to a varsity football team never having played before. Plus all of the ritual of the mass just bored the shit out of me. I tried a few different Christian denomination churches, and found that I was most comfortable with the Southern Baptists. I joined the church, and I was baptized (again) at 16.
When I reached college, I was approached by a campus ministry group, and was asked to join them in recruiting members. They explained their basic tool, "The Bridge". Their core message: if you're not with Christ, you're fucked. Okay, consider me slow, but for the first time, I thought of all of the non-Christian people in the world being "damned", and I had an epiphany - this was all bullshit. They were selling soap. The only way to get your soul truly clean was with Christ brand detergent. No thanks. I stopped going to church, and I've never been back.
More later.
This entry was posted
on Saturday, November 12, 2005 at 9:38 PM.
You can skip to the end and leave a response.
10:38 PMMy Vietnamese priest, who I love when I can understand him, told us an anecdote where he was asked if non-Christians could go to heaven. He answered, "Of course they can, and do! I'm just taking a short cut."
So, while a bit self-righteous, does not damn others to hell fire.
10:45 PM
Also, I really enjoy the story my friend J.J. wrote about people like that/
11:54 PM
Amen-
Try being raised a Jehovah's Witness for 20 years. No, I'm not kidding; I had my 1st birthday party at age 30.
Lesson learned: If you want to spend your life in batting practice with Your idea of a Supreme Being, don't shove your "ball" down the the throat of anyone else who manages to make it to 2nd. Or home.
FDC
12:25 AM
Don't know if you are already hip to it, but we recently caught an excerpt of Julia Sweeney's show "Letting go of god" in which she describes joining a bible study group to really sit down and read the text and be in touch with her catholic background. Extremely compelling bit. I am sure some of it is somewhere on This American Life site. I know, I know, you hate his voice. meh. Try to check it out, I think you may enjoy. I look forward to hearing the whole thing at some point.
12:32 AM
maybe i mis-stated: Perhaps not as much to be in touch with her catholic upbringing as to try to understand it vis a vis the bible as a primer, and to, as an adult, actually read the text since it is so prevalent in her family's religion and referred to in our society in general.
and such.
just go listen to it
12:58 AM
Technically I'm a non-practicing Mormon. On a good day I'm agnostic, on a bad day I'm atheist.
I just checked out "The Bridge" link. Eek. I can't stand it that sinful people are typically represented by the color black.
» Post a Comment