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My life, like a lot of others, is not made up of epiphanies. It’s the continual presence of small, evolving thoughts that make the biggest changes in my perspective, rather than the cataclysmic breaks from ideology. I couldn’t tell you when I first learned about evolution, though my current interest and study is clearly the result of some early interest piqued and nurtured. Nor could I pinpoint the moment I broke my covenant with God (an agreement made by others for me, before I was able to make it). It was too gradual to know when I finally parted ways with the Catholic Church.
I used to envy those with faith, thinking that by lacking it I was lacking something else far more important (turns out maybe I just don’t have the ‘god gene’). But over the years I’ve become more comfortable letting that (Catholic) guilt go. Ultimately I’ve realized that by being an unbeliever I haven’t missed out on anything and in many ways it’s kept me above (or below or around) the fray. When the Church scandals came out I was able to feel the simple human emotions of revulsion and anger instead of loss and betrayal.
There is a stigma with admitting to atheism. People react as if you just admitted you don’t like you grandmother (personal experience talking here). There is an intense pressure to explain yourself, to say what you do believe in, as if people fear that a flood or burning bush or lightening may strike you down and they might get caught in the divine punishment cross fire.
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