For those that don't know me, I grew up in a devout Catholic home and attended Catholic schools for 12 years. I am now a Humanist/Agnostic but I often use the word "atheist" because I don't care to play semantics and it gets the point across faster. This post isn't meant to incite an argument or to offend anyone. Nor is it an invitation for you to convince me that I'm wrong or invite me to your church because your church isn't like the ones I describe. If religion works for you, enjoy it! Just don't judge me because it no longer works for me. Here are my thoughts and experiences. I hope you find them reason to love more.
"Thou shalt not….."……I memorized them all….all ten. And then there were the beatitudes and the prayers and the rituals of the mass. I've read both the Bible and Catholic Catechism in their entirety. There were family rules and school rules and outside rules. I learned how to altar serve, how to lector, how to be a liturgical dancer and how to earn the Christian Achievment award every year. In many people's eyes, I was the model citizen, the model Catholic, the model child.
People often times ask me why I left the church, "What happened?" Some assume I left because I didn't want to follow their rules any more. Others assume I acquired some unbearable level of shame and that I felt unworthy of returning. Neither of these things are true. The reasons I left are many, though they mainly stem from difficulties I found in church doctrine. My brain and science as I understand it just don't jive with the stories and rules taught by any religion that I have studied. And yes, I've studied quite a few!
But the reason I've separated myself so much from all organized religion and Christianity in particular, is that what I wanted for my life and from my church community more than anything, was to be loved and I wanted to love others in return. I felt like Christianity sold me on an ideal that it didn't deliver and I'm working hard to shed my disappointment from this.
"They will know that we are Christians by our love."… that's true … isn't it?!
I wanted more than anything for this to be true. The bible taught me about a man who didn't judge, who didn't hurt, who had no sin … and yet in my experience, fewer places are filled with as much judgment and as much hurt as the walls people flock to for salvation. Inside the institution I so dedicatedly belonged to, I found myself submersed in a sea of people all pointing their fingers, all criticising and judging one another. Either 'her make-up was too dark', or he 'didn't contribute enough' or she simply wasn't following 'God's ways'. Often the biggest sponsors, the loudest mouths, the most visible faces, were the ones living double lives and I just couldn't take it. They would stand on their pulpit and condemn while in their basement they held boxes upon boxes of sins and secrets. The sins I can forgive, the condemnation of others I can't. Don't get me wrong … the soup kitchens, the clothing drives, the pregnancy centers are all worthy causes. The church has saved many lives. And for some, the structure and community that it offers is irreplaceable. For those, I would never take it away. But there is still so much work to be done within the body of the church; and for me, I have done better without it.
My church taught me to love IT and it taught me to do things to gain God's praise …. but it really didn't teach me to love others, or myself. I wanted God to be happy. I wanted my parents and teachers to be happy and I got so caught up in what the rules were that I failed to truly love. And I'm not alone in this, I'm just more honest than most. For years, I followed this lifestyle, fooling myself that I was happy, that I did love everyone. But there was a storm inside of me …. an unrest. I didn't realize, while I was in the midst of it, just how hard it was for me to love without restraint. There were so many rules that excluded others- homosexuals, atheists, those engaging in premarital sex, divorcees, liberals. And as I left the nest and explored the world as an independent adult, I began to discover that some of the best humans I'd ever met just so happened to live alternative lifestyles, held different beliefs and subscribed to different politics than the ones I was raised to believe were the "one and true". The people I was raised to look down on, to judge, were kinder and more honest humans than the people who sat next to me in church every Sunday.
I had no idea how unhappy and weighted down I was with the judgment of others, until I escaped it.
Maybe it wasn't the church … maybe it was my background … where my parents came from. Maybe it was the church members who were attracted to me because of my role-model status, who were fundamental in their beliefs. Maybe it was me. A degree of self-centeredness and a lack of perspective is common in childhood, I believe. I suppose it's also common for it to carry into adulthood for a time. Maybe my loss of religion and gain of love for humanity was just 'maturity' and my faith was just a coincidental and unfortunate casualty.
Wherever their origin, those judgments clung to me and hung from my neck like weights. Until, through my own adult journey, I learned to disrobe them. You ask me why? Why I left?… Why I changed?… Why I still get angry at the church sometimes? Because the moment I became aware of my own judgement towards others, I felt the burden I was carrying and it became unbearable. It cut into my neck and I struggled tirelessly to rid myself of it. Every day I looked for a new perspective, a new understanding, a new love. I was tired of hating my fellow man because he didn't follow the rules I was taught. I was tired of being a part of a community that spent more time telling people what they should and should not do than simply loving them.
And I was tired of being loved conditionally. I was a "good girl". I wore my medallions and walked to church … before school even! I studied my faith every day for 12 years and I subscribed to what I knew was "holy". Their words instructed me to be honest, to respect, to obey and to be faithful. I knew what they wanted to see and I gave it to them. I thrived on positive reinforcement and I longed for structure. And I did it, knowing that if I didn't, they'd dismiss me like all the rest. I did it, because I wanted to be loved and I wanted to feel worthy. My home life was nothing for people to be proud of … nor were my academics … I was an average student; But my dedication to my faith made people proud. And I loved that.
As I began to venture outside of the church community, I expected the world to eat me alive. Afterall, that's what I was taught would happen; instead, they accepted me. Outside the walls of the sanctuary, I learned that I was loved and I was worthy, regardless of the medallions and the commandments and the mass schedule. Wearing short shorts, using swear words, having a sex life … didn't take away from the fact that I was kind and generous and honest. My worth wasn't based on those things anymore. Outside the church community, I could help people and still be "me". And I could do so without the sideways glances and the whispers and the disappointment. And believe you me, those whispers are deafening when its you that they talk about.
Without a church, I learned how to love like a Christian and live as an Atheist.
I am lighter now and yet I still carry a heaviness in my heart because so many still don't understand their hypocrisy. They don't understand the unspoken lessons they carved into my soul and the journey I took to erase them. What I would like them to know, what I'd like them to see, is that its the way they treat everyone else that speaks volumes. It doesn't take a saint to love babies and it's only human to feel compassion for the homeless and the destitute. But what about the un-holy, the un-faithful, the falling but not quite hitting rock bottom yet? Do you work as hard to catch someone when they're slipping as you do after they've hit rock bottom. It's not hard to help someone when they've got nowhere else to turn … but what about when they have a choice? Will you love them just the same if they fail to subscribe to your teachings?
What I want the church to know is that its walls are filled with little girls and boys who are watching. I was once that little girl and I learned the most by watching. Every time someone shook their head at that "other girl", I learned how to pass judgement on her. With every patronizing giggle, I was taught to feel insecure and inadequate. When they were "embarrassed for her" and "felt sorry for her mother", I knew they'd one day be embarrassed of me and I felt sorry for myself. When they said they were "proud" that I "wasn't like her", I saw myself in her. They ministered to the poor and yet they abandoned the girl next-door. Silently, not so silently they taught me. They said they were "proud" of me … but the conditioning had already been set, my sense of self-worth already tarnished. "Be yourself" they said …"but not like that". "I've never judged you", they said, but I'd watched them judge the world and I was afraid they wouldn't love who I really was.
They told me that if I laid with a man who had failed to put a ring on my hand, it only meant that he would leave me. Girls that did that were trashy whores. Only men worthy of waiting with me, were worthy of marrying me. It was a valid possibility, but when pounded and pounded with no other alternative it seemed to be an absolute truth. So when I did lay with a man prior to marriage, my expectations were set. And when he did leave, I felt nothing. They told me so. To avoid the hurt, I learned to be defiant and then to be numbed. I didn't know then, that the man who would fulfill all my dreams, would be a sinner just like me …. and that he wouldn't leave, but instead beg to stay.
They taught me that while abortion was a grave sin, sex before marriage was also a unnegotiable one. And so without instruction or even self-awareness, I learned as a child to look for a ring when I saw a gravid belly. When the un-wed in our community ended up pregnant, we were embarrassed for them … less concerned because of the difficulties their future would hold in education or love or finance, but embarrassed because it was evident that they had sinned. That evidence which stuck out in front of them, a round belly, for the whole world to see and pity, held a miracle … but people only saw that when they stood outside the abortion clinic. Despite leaving the church several years before, when my own bare hands held my own swollen belly, I felt ashamed. And it left me pretending to be something that I wasn't – either unashamed or betrothed.
With the storm brewing inside of me, I felt like a wild animal who was tethered. Pulling, pulling, I broke free and when I did, I ran, never to go back to that place again. I don't want to be a Christian anymore – but I want to love like one is supposed to. It is my journey to understand not to judge. To listen and to forgive, not to justify. To see and to help, not to turn my head. To lend a hand with no expectations of changing ones beliefs. The world as a whole is a much larger picture than one altar. And I am better person because I cut the ties that taught me to judge and learned to love without rules.
This atheist is going to show to world how to love …. like a Christian should. And if I do, if I can learn to love all people without restraint, including the Christian, than their god tells me, they will see who I am. And I guess that's all I really wanted …. to be seen and loved for who I really am and for others to love in return.
