A brief history of my family's relationship with religion along with an explanation of my "atheism".
As a religion-less heathen, I try to find some way to compensate for the resulting immorality to which I am prone to. Atheists, of course, are known for their intolerance and vile crimes against humanity. Oh wait, nope. No one ever fought a cause "for atheism". But I digress here with my somewhat disrespectful propaganda. I believe that morality and codes of ethics should not be dictated by a larger force - for some people that force is the church and for others it may be the government or some other great external power that claims to know what's best. I think that at first, a child's guiding "code of morality" should come from his/her parents. Children don't really have a complete sense of the world and their source of guidance for proper behavior or thought can come from a "larger power" in that sense. However, the purpose of parenting is to cultivate a free-thinking mind. A good parent will allow a child to slowly discover what he or she believes regarding morality and "religion" rather than forcing religious faith upon them continuously.
My parents stopped forcing Catholicism on me when I was about five years old. They were never very religious in the first place, and I think that their attempts to breed us Catholic were mainly out of pressure from co-workers or friends. The beginning to the end of my mother's religious faith began when she was around seven or eight. St. Lucia was 96% Catholic in those days (before Mormons and Seventh Day Adventists began their conversions) and it was common for children to make their First Holy Communion around that age. Now, my mother grew up one of six children (her youngest brother would not yet have been born) and my grandmother worked at home while my grandfather was an electrician. They were not wealthy, and first communion "classes" cost a lot more than they could afford. My grandfather talked to the priest about being unable to pay and told him that if he really cared about "saving children" he would let them take the classes for free. The priest declined them and that was the end of the Fevrier parents attempts to add religion to their children. Various aunts and uncles through the course of the years did bring my mother and her sisters to different churches, but that incident stuck with my mother in particular and I think prevented her from ever truly buying into the holiness of religion.
My father's relationship with religion is a little bit more of a mystery to me. I know that he grew up somewhat Methodist. His Bible from the 1970s was gifted to me when I first started attending Catholic school. From viewing old pictures, I know he was in a church choir and from hearing snippets of stories I know something about an attempt at joining a seminary or perhaps spending some time there. The entirety my father's religious past is somewhat shady but I am certain now he is as atheist as they come, especially since his favorite Bill Maher piece is "Religulous" and "The Evolution of God" takes up a large space on his bookshelf.
When my parents met in St. Lucia, my father was in the Peace Corps and my mother was a teacher (I believe at Ciceron Primary School, which I think no longer exists). I am in the dark on the details of their dating life, and completely okay with that, but when they became engaged and were set to be married they wanted it to happen in a church. Cultural traditions were more powerful than their personal religious beliefs, and the majority of my mother's extended family belonged to some religion or another and would expect a church wedding.
My parents first went to a Catholic church to seek a priest who would marry them and were told they had to sit through six months of marriage classes, the contents of which I cannot even begin to imagine. Neither of them had any intention of waiting six months to be married. They went to a Methodist priest who agreed to marry them, apparently without a six month delay, and lo, my parents were all of a sudden Methodists.
As a result of my parents deviation from church allegiance of any sort, they did not attempt to force any sort of values on us from the church. My sister and I were baptized Catholic, and they brought us to church a few times but then got tired of the fuss of dressing up for church and driving there, listening to a boring priest and then dealing with their grouchy toddlers who hated fancy clothing and sitting down for too long. Of course, we were well behaved during church, but we did not enjoy it.
Eventually my sister and I figured out on our own how to live independently of religion. This was something we were sort of trained towards by our parents but didn't completely realize until now. I have no ties to any religious faith. If that makes me a bad person and if that means I am going to hell, well so be it. I'd rather be somewhere with deep thinkers and people who question blind faith in an external larger than life being than surrounded by sheep.
I am not an unethical person. I do not steal, I "honor my mother and my father" and I have not killed anyone. I didn't need ten commandments from on high to tell me to do this. I do not pass judgment on others or condemn them to an eternity of suffering because we do not share beliefs. I didn't need Catholicism or any religion to tell me how to live. I figured it out. There's something instinctive about knowing not to kill someone. And to me, there seems to be something more practical about not hating someone for their sexuality or because they think differently than I do.
I find it interesting how people cite the Bible or religious texts for reasons to hate each other, when the idea of Christianity is supposed to be all about brotherly love. I suppose by interesting, I actually mean that I find it hypocritical. I also find it "interesting" that the worst gossips I know who will cut down someone else for any deviance from the norm are staunch Christians.
I am not saying that all Christians are inherently bad due to their Christianity. I know quite a few very religious people, young and old, who actually uphold the values of Christianity and project an understanding of their ethical code in their every day life. However, without Christianity, I think these people would be just as ethical. The church gives people an excuse for immoral behavior. "Oh, if I just confess, I'll go to heaven anyway".
These escapes from unjust behavior serve to promote rather than decrease unethical behavior. My punishment for doing something sinful, is that I will have to live with it. When I deviate from what is right by judging people, acting rudely to my parents or gossiping about someone, I am punished by knowing that I have done something wrong and I will have to live with myself. There is no easy way out. There is no "apologizing to God". If I treat my friends badly, my "way out" is apologizing to them. Ten rosaries muttered hastily in the dark will not save me.
Some people may need religion to guide them. Perhaps they feel lost without it. That is okay. I am trying to wrap my head around being accepting of something that I find ridiculous and although it may not sound like it, I am really trying not to judge others for having a different take on spirituality than I do. Perhaps my atheistic arrogance will not ever permit me to understand, but it's something I struggle with and something I cannot find an easy escape from through prayer. I take responsibility for my faults, without blaming or fearing a Satanic force. A part of my spirituality is accepting responsibility where I need to, and I view that as more valuable and more helpful to being a good person than prayer or sitting half-heartedly through a church service eyeing my watch with the intent of returning home to sin.
