My Break With Religion
I’m going to be a little more serious in this post. I might even get to somber. Bear with me, it will be over soon.
I’ve been struggling with my own identity recently. One part of it was identifying myself as a Christian. Mostly I’ve done it for my whole life as I was brought up in a Christian family, went to church every now and again, and basically identified myself that way because my parents identified themselves that way. I’ve had a hard time reconciling the way I try to exist in this world with not only the way that public ‘religious’ figures and groups act, but with my father as well.
I’ve tried very hard in my life to avoid becoming one of those cliched men who has issues with his father. We still have a pretty good relationship – I don’t believe in many of the same things he does anymore (I voted for Obama in this last election and my dad is a staunch Republican and NRA member), but we can still get along. Hell, I went to my parents’ house for dinner tonight. However, my ability to remain civil is stretched to the limit when my dad can stand in front of me and tell me things like "I don’t believe in evolution."
My personality and…character (I couldn’t come up with a better word) are based on science. For as long as I can remember, I’ve studied everything I possibly can. I’ve made it one of my lifetime goals to learn anything and everything that I have an opportunity to pick up. I’m a PC technician by trade, a writer and programmer for fun, and a scientist through and through. So when a large group of people can even consider electing people to office who believe in things like dinosaurs and people co-existing, or that the world is only 3000 or so years old, it disappoints me tremendously. It’s an even greater blow when people in my own family express these opinions.
All of this leads me to the decision to completely disconnect myself from religious labels. I no longer consider myself religious, and I especially don’t subscribe to any specific religious beliefs (like Christianity). I do not want to be associated with the public religious groups, good or bad. This is not to say I’m an atheist, as that’s another religious label. I just want to live my life, and learn everything. That’s right – I want to know everything.
And if you’re wondering, I’m not trying to paint all religious people with the same brush. I actually think this will be a personal step closer to appreciating people as individuals more often than I have in the past.
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Religion is an interesting topic to delve in – I honestly think a lot more of the “younger generations” are abandoning the church ideals because of how unbending they are, and unwilling to “evolve” themselves. That’s not to say it’s bad to believe in something, it’d just be nice if they allowed these beliefs and “traditions” to go a bit more with the flow…
The religious groups are so hypocritical it’s very difficult to take any of them seriously. Personal beliefs are personal, and our age group needs something more specific to our circumstances to believe in. Once upon a time the earth was flat…