Why I abandoned religion: a personal story
Up to this point, I've made one post on religion, where I took a look at how religion presents itself in Finland, and shortly mentioned my personal views on it in the introduction to this blog. Apart from that, I really haven't talked about it, even though I feel pretty passionately about it. So, I've decided to change that. This post, as the title suggests, will. I be about my personal experiences with religion and how that led me to abandon religion altogether. The motivation for this post is the fact that many people still find it weird that somebody would leave their religion. There are also a lot of misconceptions about the reasons behind the decision to leave religion. So, I really just want to put my experiences out there to try and fix some of them.
In my previous post on this topic, I mentioned that around 73% of the Finnish population are a part of some religious group, with the overwhelming majority, around 71% adhering to the Lutheran branch of Christianity. Just like most Finns, I was raised within the Lutheran church as well. My family has a pretty strong connection to the Church, as multiple of my relatives, both past and present have worked or are currently working for the Church, especially from my mother's side, including multiple priests. Needless to say that religion played a part in my life growing up.
Now, despite the strong connection with the Lutheran Church, religion wasn't something to dominate over everything. Me and my siblings were never forced to go to church, so we really only went during Christmas or special occasions like weddings or funerals and after going through confirmation, we were allowed to stay at home during Christmas. The only times we prayed together was before bed time, which in my case ended when I was around 10 or 11 and was allowed to stay up a bit later than my brother, who's three years younger than me. To put it simply, I was a Christian because that's what I was told and I never really put any thought into it until my late teens.
That being said, I did have something of a religious awakening during my early teens. The seeds for that were planted while I was on fifth grade when we had some guy from a local Pentecostal Church visit our class to tell about activities they had for youth. During his presentation I got interested and after finding out that my friend was already going there, I decided to take part as well. Naturally, since the events were organized by a religious group, they involved religious teachings, which at first weren't too different from what I had already heard at home. I kept going to these events actively until the age of 15. The reason why I kept going there for all those years was because I felt I had found a place where I could be myself. You see, during those years, I was being heavily bullied in school, lot of the people behind it being people I thought were my friends. Then suddenly, I found this place where I was accepted. I made new friends and the religious teachings really began resonating with me. The idea of a loving God: no matter what was going in my life, I could always trust God and that He would always be there for me, to support me at my darkest times: it was a comforting thought during those times. Then, everything began to change.
As I said, at first the teachings weren't that different from what I had already heard at home and my rare visits to church, but that began to change. The first events I took part in were meant for pre-teens, so when I turned 13 I began going to events meant for teenagers and young adults. The mood changed pretty much immediately. Compared to previous experiences in these events, more time was being spent on religious teaching. Lot of people also stopped going, meaning I lost some of the people I had made friends with, so it wasn't as fun as it used to be. Not only that, but the teachings began turning more and more extreme, reaching a level I simply could not accept. While previously we had been told about a loving God who we could always rely on, this suddenly changed into, among other things, blatant homophobia. Suddenly this all loving God seemed to have a lot of conditions for His love. Apart from this, everything was suddenly the work of Satan. Anything from certain books, certain types of music to different religions were suddenly being portrayed as the work of the Devil.
At the same time I was also starting the process towards confirmation. In case you don't know, confirmation basically means becoming a full member of your congregation. At least in the Finnish Lutheran Church, confirmation usually happens in the year you turn 15 and it's preceded by a series of classes aimed at teaching you the basics of doctrine. So while the teachings in the Pentecostal church I had been going for few years began turning into something I could not stand by, I also began learning things about "my own faith" in more detail. What I noticed was the staggering differences between what were supposedly just too different sects of the same religion. Despite both sects being based on the Bible, there were too many differences to ignore. Noticing this planted the seeds of doubt about the whole idea of religion.
The basic difference between the two is the way they look at the Bible. For one, Pentecostals tend to be more fundamentalist and are generally more serious towards the Bible and that explains a lot of the things they teach. Blatant homophobia? The Bible is pretty clear about homosexuality being wrong. Labeling certain books, for example Harry Potter as satanic? Well, the characters have magical powers and the Bible does state that God doesn't like sorcery or witchcraft. In other words, the only source for their powers can be Satan, which of course is a bad thing, even though the books are fictional. Other religions? They've been formed by false prophets sent by Satan to distract the world from the truth. Certain types of music? Well, as a metalhead, I admit that a lot of bands do use satanic imagery in their act, whether just for the shock factor or to actually glorify Satan. You get the point: from this literal view of the Bible makes it easy to justify all these things, no matter how idiotic they are. Pentecostals often times tend to be creationists, because that's what the Bible says. Again, from their point of view, it makes complete sense.
Lutheranism on the other hand tends to be more moderate in it's approach to the Bible. Some of the priests I dealt with described the Bible as "Word about God", instead of it being the literal word of God. Essentially Lutherans tend to see the Bible as more symbolical than the literal truth. That way they can pass on some of the more outrageous parts of it, claiming that those passages were simply a product of their time. On the other hand, even the most literal minded believers do the same thing, making them a bunch of hypocrites, but I digress. The point is, while there are more hard line Lutherans, this general approach to the Bible makes the Lutheran Church to be generally more open towards the LGBT community, other religions, etc.
As I said, noticing these differences were just the start on my journey towards atheism. After getting confirmed, I spent the next few years in church activities, for example, acting as a counselor on church camps. I also did continue going to the Pentecostal events, but stopped going after a while, because as I said, it wasn't as much fun as it used to be, because of the combination of fewer people going and the bigoted teachings towards anything that didn't fully conform to their world view. I spent the next three years or so trying to reconcile my liberal view of the world with religion, but simply wasn't able to do so. However, it did not turn me into an atheist directly. Rather, I developed belief in some kind of a vague higher power. I guess you could call it a form of deism. Despite this I kept taking part in church activities until shortly after my 18th birthday.
So, what ultimately pushed me to abandon the last remnants of religion? It was none other that Richard Dawkins, and his book "The God Delusion". Shortly before actually reading the book, Finnish metal band Nightwish released their album "Endless Forms Most Beautiful", which included an appearance by Dawkins. The bands keyboardist and main song writer Tuomas Holopainen has stated that while writing the album ,he had been inspired by Dawkins' work, which gave him the idea to ask him to appear on the album. As you might already guess, this led to some backlash from some of the bands fans: it was unacceptable to have this godless heathen who dares to speak out against God to appear on the album. Without this, I may have never decided to read "The God Delusion" in the first place, but this outrage from fans, which actually did brake the news in some Finnish tabloids, made me want to find out what this man had to say. Before actually picking up the book, I started by watching videos about Dawkins on YouTube. The things he said resonated with me. The things he said made sense. After watching a lot of these videos, in some of which they mentioned "The God Delusion", I decided to check if I could find the book in our local library and after noticing they did have it, I decided to read it. Afterwards, I was an atheist.
I didn't "come out" as an atheist to my family for another year. During that time I began diving deeper into this topic, learning about it as much as I could. I even started a short lived blog under an alias to express my views, but I lost interest in that fairly quickly. I finally "came out" on a Facebook post, in which I shared a YouTube video detailing the persecution faced by non-believers around the world and gave my pretty strong thoughts on the topic. Few months later, shortly before starting my civil service, I also decided to officially leave the Church I was raised in. And no, I don't regret it. Even though believers often times like to portray atheists as a bunch of miserable people who have no meaning in life, it couldn't be further from the truth. Since leaving religion, my life has much better than it used to be. I don't have to perform mental gymnastics to reconcile my views with a worldview that ultimately goes against those views. I can truly be myself and I don't have to justify my choices to a higher power constantly judging me. This is the only life I'll have, so I've decided to spend my time on this planet to try and change for the better. I hope I can inspire others to do the same.
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In my previous post on this topic, I mentioned that around 73% of the Finnish population are a part of some religious group, with the overwhelming majority, around 71% adhering to the Lutheran branch of Christianity. Just like most Finns, I was raised within the Lutheran church as well. My family has a pretty strong connection to the Church, as multiple of my relatives, both past and present have worked or are currently working for the Church, especially from my mother's side, including multiple priests. Needless to say that religion played a part in my life growing up.
Now, despite the strong connection with the Lutheran Church, religion wasn't something to dominate over everything. Me and my siblings were never forced to go to church, so we really only went during Christmas or special occasions like weddings or funerals and after going through confirmation, we were allowed to stay at home during Christmas. The only times we prayed together was before bed time, which in my case ended when I was around 10 or 11 and was allowed to stay up a bit later than my brother, who's three years younger than me. To put it simply, I was a Christian because that's what I was told and I never really put any thought into it until my late teens.
That being said, I did have something of a religious awakening during my early teens. The seeds for that were planted while I was on fifth grade when we had some guy from a local Pentecostal Church visit our class to tell about activities they had for youth. During his presentation I got interested and after finding out that my friend was already going there, I decided to take part as well. Naturally, since the events were organized by a religious group, they involved religious teachings, which at first weren't too different from what I had already heard at home. I kept going to these events actively until the age of 15. The reason why I kept going there for all those years was because I felt I had found a place where I could be myself. You see, during those years, I was being heavily bullied in school, lot of the people behind it being people I thought were my friends. Then suddenly, I found this place where I was accepted. I made new friends and the religious teachings really began resonating with me. The idea of a loving God: no matter what was going in my life, I could always trust God and that He would always be there for me, to support me at my darkest times: it was a comforting thought during those times. Then, everything began to change.
As I said, at first the teachings weren't that different from what I had already heard at home and my rare visits to church, but that began to change. The first events I took part in were meant for pre-teens, so when I turned 13 I began going to events meant for teenagers and young adults. The mood changed pretty much immediately. Compared to previous experiences in these events, more time was being spent on religious teaching. Lot of people also stopped going, meaning I lost some of the people I had made friends with, so it wasn't as fun as it used to be. Not only that, but the teachings began turning more and more extreme, reaching a level I simply could not accept. While previously we had been told about a loving God who we could always rely on, this suddenly changed into, among other things, blatant homophobia. Suddenly this all loving God seemed to have a lot of conditions for His love. Apart from this, everything was suddenly the work of Satan. Anything from certain books, certain types of music to different religions were suddenly being portrayed as the work of the Devil.
At the same time I was also starting the process towards confirmation. In case you don't know, confirmation basically means becoming a full member of your congregation. At least in the Finnish Lutheran Church, confirmation usually happens in the year you turn 15 and it's preceded by a series of classes aimed at teaching you the basics of doctrine. So while the teachings in the Pentecostal church I had been going for few years began turning into something I could not stand by, I also began learning things about "my own faith" in more detail. What I noticed was the staggering differences between what were supposedly just too different sects of the same religion. Despite both sects being based on the Bible, there were too many differences to ignore. Noticing this planted the seeds of doubt about the whole idea of religion.
The basic difference between the two is the way they look at the Bible. For one, Pentecostals tend to be more fundamentalist and are generally more serious towards the Bible and that explains a lot of the things they teach. Blatant homophobia? The Bible is pretty clear about homosexuality being wrong. Labeling certain books, for example Harry Potter as satanic? Well, the characters have magical powers and the Bible does state that God doesn't like sorcery or witchcraft. In other words, the only source for their powers can be Satan, which of course is a bad thing, even though the books are fictional. Other religions? They've been formed by false prophets sent by Satan to distract the world from the truth. Certain types of music? Well, as a metalhead, I admit that a lot of bands do use satanic imagery in their act, whether just for the shock factor or to actually glorify Satan. You get the point: from this literal view of the Bible makes it easy to justify all these things, no matter how idiotic they are. Pentecostals often times tend to be creationists, because that's what the Bible says. Again, from their point of view, it makes complete sense.
Lutheranism on the other hand tends to be more moderate in it's approach to the Bible. Some of the priests I dealt with described the Bible as "Word about God", instead of it being the literal word of God. Essentially Lutherans tend to see the Bible as more symbolical than the literal truth. That way they can pass on some of the more outrageous parts of it, claiming that those passages were simply a product of their time. On the other hand, even the most literal minded believers do the same thing, making them a bunch of hypocrites, but I digress. The point is, while there are more hard line Lutherans, this general approach to the Bible makes the Lutheran Church to be generally more open towards the LGBT community, other religions, etc.
As I said, noticing these differences were just the start on my journey towards atheism. After getting confirmed, I spent the next few years in church activities, for example, acting as a counselor on church camps. I also did continue going to the Pentecostal events, but stopped going after a while, because as I said, it wasn't as much fun as it used to be, because of the combination of fewer people going and the bigoted teachings towards anything that didn't fully conform to their world view. I spent the next three years or so trying to reconcile my liberal view of the world with religion, but simply wasn't able to do so. However, it did not turn me into an atheist directly. Rather, I developed belief in some kind of a vague higher power. I guess you could call it a form of deism. Despite this I kept taking part in church activities until shortly after my 18th birthday.
So, what ultimately pushed me to abandon the last remnants of religion? It was none other that Richard Dawkins, and his book "The God Delusion". Shortly before actually reading the book, Finnish metal band Nightwish released their album "Endless Forms Most Beautiful", which included an appearance by Dawkins. The bands keyboardist and main song writer Tuomas Holopainen has stated that while writing the album ,he had been inspired by Dawkins' work, which gave him the idea to ask him to appear on the album. As you might already guess, this led to some backlash from some of the bands fans: it was unacceptable to have this godless heathen who dares to speak out against God to appear on the album. Without this, I may have never decided to read "The God Delusion" in the first place, but this outrage from fans, which actually did brake the news in some Finnish tabloids, made me want to find out what this man had to say. Before actually picking up the book, I started by watching videos about Dawkins on YouTube. The things he said resonated with me. The things he said made sense. After watching a lot of these videos, in some of which they mentioned "The God Delusion", I decided to check if I could find the book in our local library and after noticing they did have it, I decided to read it. Afterwards, I was an atheist.
I didn't "come out" as an atheist to my family for another year. During that time I began diving deeper into this topic, learning about it as much as I could. I even started a short lived blog under an alias to express my views, but I lost interest in that fairly quickly. I finally "came out" on a Facebook post, in which I shared a YouTube video detailing the persecution faced by non-believers around the world and gave my pretty strong thoughts on the topic. Few months later, shortly before starting my civil service, I also decided to officially leave the Church I was raised in. And no, I don't regret it. Even though believers often times like to portray atheists as a bunch of miserable people who have no meaning in life, it couldn't be further from the truth. Since leaving religion, my life has much better than it used to be. I don't have to perform mental gymnastics to reconcile my views with a worldview that ultimately goes against those views. I can truly be myself and I don't have to justify my choices to a higher power constantly judging me. This is the only life I'll have, so I've decided to spend my time on this planet to try and change for the better. I hope I can inspire others to do the same.
Follow me on Twitter
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