Mr Spinkles said:
I don't think it's accurate to say that atheism is a decision, although this may be true some of the time, for some people. It was not true for me. I never decided not to believe any more, I was incapable of believing any more.
Why was I incapable of believing anymore? That's a difficult question to answer. I suppose I had simply read and learned and questioned too many things. It never felt like a decision, it felt more like all the facts I sought out intruded themselves upon my worldview, altering it in ways I didn't anticipate, or want.
For example, I studied the NT in a high school theology class. I was committed to believing the stories, but it was tough. I expected to be blown away by the truth and profundity of NT stories. But Jesus rubbing dirt and spit in a blind man's eyes to heal him? Casting out a horde of demons and putting them into a bunch of pigs? The Gospels were written 100 years after the fact, by non-eyewitnesses? They contradict each other? I was swimming against a current of facts and reason.
And then I read things like Socrates' apology, and Siddhartha, and Hume's arguments about "miracles", and I learned about evolution and the laws of thermodynamics, etc. Now here were things which really did blow me away with their truth and profundity, with no special effort on my part.
Another example: I was one of several Kairos leaders (it's a sort of spiritual retreat for the senior class) at my Catholic high school. I wrote a short speech and practiced it in front of some teachers and students beforehand. I was questioning the human characteristics of God, saying that it seems to me you need a brain to have intelligence and emotions; unless God has a brain, he must not have these qualities; we just project intelligence and emotions onto God because that's the natural way for us to understand something that is ultimately beyond our comprehension.
The teachers were not happy at all. Apparently I had committed some sort of grave sin, without realizing it. They said I had to write a different speech. In fact, I had to write about a different topic entirely. In my own mind, I was exploring theological ideas which made God more plausible, more worthy of contemplation, more compatible with science. I knew my ideas departed from the traditional ones, and so it felt almost like a confession of deviation; but I still thought I was within the bounds of Christianity. And it seemed to me that it was all in the spirit of Kairos: deep, thoughtful reflection about God. That's exactly what I was doing. (Of course, what any traditional religious retreat means by deep reflection is the kind of "reflection" which reaffirms the standard dogmas, and keeps within the modest wiggle room allowed by those dogmas.)
However, one teacher said, very gravely, I was basically advocating atheism. The manner in which he said this, and the way it was received by everyone (including me) and the subsequent tone in the room, was exactly the same as if he had said (correctly) that I was basically advocating racism.
After all, if God doesn't have intelligence or emotions, it's not really "God", it's just "the Universe" or something. "Atheism" wasn't a word I was very familiar with, but I knew it had connotations of a ridiculous, absurd, mean-spirited rejection of everything sane and good. That's why my speech could not be allowed. It was startling, and embarrassing, and shameful to hear that I had said something so corrupting, that I could not say it in front of all my friends and teachers. Because I had merely confessed what was on my mind...do I have a twisted mind? And was my speech so different from the speech another student gave, about how God wants this and that, etc.....it's all honest speculation anyway, right?
But it slowly occurred to me that, whether I liked it or not, whether I had intended it or not, he was right, what I was saying was not much different from atheism. I couldn't see any way around it.
