Leaving the Garden: Kevin’s Journey
Posted by John on February 1st, 2008 at 1:13 am · 7 Comments
Note: This is the latest installment of “Leaving the Garden,” a weekly series in which we ask someone to reflect on their journey from religious conviction to uncertainty, from dogmatism to doubt. Religion is filled with stories of faith; here we will collect narratives of unbelief. If you’d like to share your story of doubt, please leave a comment indicating your interest and I will contact you with guidelines.
This week’s contributor is Kevin, who I met in a course on Modern Atheism. He is currently a graduate student in philosophy in Germany and has an excellent blog in which he messes with philosophers and has been known to make detailed comparisons between individual philosophers and members of the X-men. He prefers to describe himself in the following manner: “Kevin is a thought trainer. He asks thoughts to enter his mind and tells them, with his best German accent, ‘I will pump… you up!’ He also likes photography.”
My first encounter with religion only lasted around two weeks. In (circa) the first grade my parents sent my sister and me to Sunday school. My first reason for not wanting to go was because I wanted to sleep in; the second reason was because I found the teacher’s drawing of heaven and hell strange (heaven on top, living people in the middle, hell on the bottom). God, heaven and hell were all new concepts to me because they were never used at home – I was not interested in hearing more about them and my parents didn’t force us to go back. I didn’t think about God or religion again until people started asking me about my beliefs when I was in my late teens. Because I was unprepared for these questions, I told people that I believed in a God – when asked a second time I would say, “I guess I don’t”. That is when my second encounter with religion started. I began reading both first and secondary texts and was compelled to be critical and compelled to use the word “atheist” as a descriptor to my character. I eventually forgot about religion again and questions about God.
These days I shy away from the word “atheist” because I don’t like to be tied to “theism”. I’m not the negation of something, theism isn’t the worldview and mine is its negation. When people ask me about God I tell them that I’m non-religious, which is interpreted as non-practicing. What I mean, of course, is that my life is without religion.
I suppose the word “skeptic” describes me fairly well as I approach theories of the world with the intention of finding their merely subjective (or human) underpinnings. I don’t believe in Truth so, like one opens a book to look for Waldo, I look for the un-truth (un-truth is also constantly wearing red and white striped shirts and hats). I study philosophy not to find answers but to encounter and overcome non-answers. I don’t feel I’m missing something or that there is a hole that needs to be filled. I’m sitting in my chair feeling very fulfilled.
My parents received heavy criticism from my Father’s family for not raising my sister and me more religiously. I imagine them being surprised when they found out that I led an introduction to moral theory class. My parents now admit that they were nervous about whether or not they made the right choice in raising us outside of religion – they don’t regret their choice, however, because my sister and I are doing just spiffy.
Tags: Atheism · Leaving the Garden
