NYCparalegal

Just wondering... was there astrange realization about specific fundamentalist beliefs that completely turned you off from fundamentalist Christianity or Christianity/theism altogether?

My breaking point came when I was dating a nice intelligent guy who was slowly being fundified by his church... He became more and more fundified as we dated. One time, I accompanied him to the church and we sat down with the pastor for what he called a "get-to-know couples interview" thing...

Anyway, it told me flat out that if I had any intention to marry this guy I'd have to drop out of college, because it would take away from my "wifely duties", it would corrupt my morals and my mind and, lo and behold!, would make me into a God-hating lesbian femi-Nazi child killer, made even worse since I was a biochemistry major believing in all sorts of hocus pocus science such as, say, genetics and evolutionary biology... (of course, none of that happened, except for my mind having expanded a few centimeters)...

I was so disgusted by this attack on me by someone who didn't even know me that I promptly dumped this guy and broke my own heart rather than spend another minute listening to this bunch of warm and gooey crapola. Since then, I've been very wary and turned off by all sorts of fundamentalism...:banghead:

ImGod

A friend of mine had a brother who died in a car accident from a broken leg. They were operating on him and he was bleeding too much, so they woke him from the operation and asked if they could give him a transfusion. He decline on religious principles. They finished the operation and he died later that day.

His mother praised god for maintaining her sons convictions to the end, knowing he had done what was right to get into heaven. He was 26. His father divorced his mother over the loss of the son blaming her for his excessive religious beliefs. My friend left the church for a more moderate Methodist church, but still holds onto some of the old views of a subservient wife that takes care the household, children crap.

Psycho Economist

Well, I was scared away from liberal Christianity long before I gave up on Fundamentalism. But there wasn't one particular breaking point... just a slow ever-growing rift that I could no longer straddle. And I chose to stand on the side that looked firmer (Biblical metaphor notwithstanding)

Bree

For me, it was the fact that I was doing everything I possibly could to follow all of the rules that Christianity had set forth for me (in order that I could call myself a "good Christian" and claim to be right with God) and that still wasn't good enough for them (or for Jesus, either). There is only so much strain a person can take until she realises that it's all for naught.

mike_decock

For me it was the realization that "Salvation by Faith" is utterly absurd.

-Mike...

Cofffee

I have the Church of Christ to thank for making me think about what I believe in and why. It sparked the realization that Christians are not unified by Christ and have widely varying beliefs.

I was never a member of CoC, but in my early years at university, I was invited by some of these people to a bible study. Being a believer at the time, and not having a church or group I associated with while at university, I thought I would try it. I quickly saw that the Bible Study was nothing more than a manipulation session (e.g. only 3 people in this silly Bible study, one of them being me).

I disagreed with their stance that baptism was required for salvation and I just never heard the end of it from them. They were going on and on about how I was going to hell for my beliefs and I was sick of arguing over trivialities, so I just never showed up to their next scheduled bible study.

It took fundies more fundy than myself to get me thinking about this stuff and eventually, here is where I ended up, an unbeliever posting on the IIDB.

The Lone Ranger

There was no particular "breaking point" for me, but there was an experience that convinced me once and for all that Fundamentalism leads to a form of insanity. It was the last time I ever attended church.

The preacher was going on about how evil it is to watch television. To illustrate his point, he told us of how he used to watch lots of television when he was younger. To punish him for this "sinful" behavior, God caused the preacher's son to sicken. The preacher, however, didn't get the message, and so his son died.

The preacher went on to tell us that he had continued to watch television, despite the "clear warning from God" -- namely, the death of his son. Soon, his daughter began to grow ill. Finally, just in the nick of time, the preacher saw the light and got rid of his television. Almost immediately, his daughter regained her health.

He trotted his daughter up onto the stage and showed her off to us. Her good health, he said, was proof of God's "love and mercy." I felt sick. I walked out, and never returned.

Cheers,

Michael

girlwriter

My fundie pastor became obsessed with raising money for a bigger sanctuary. I was 17 and didn't have any, so I was getting tired of the guilt trips. When a girl from my church and high school called me at home to see why I wasn't going to church, if anything was wrong, did I need a ride, I was really turned off. It was a huge church, and no one there ever even spoke to me. The irony of it kills me.

I think the main thing for me was just exposure to the world, though. I was in a fundie Presbytarian church, my dad and sisters are LDS, and in-laws are all Catholics. None of them get it. All of them do the same damn thing. They destroy their family relationships in the name of religion. Makes me sick.

Calzaer

I couldn't develop a personal relationship with Christ. It was less like having an invisible friend and more like having an invisible father. My real father was overbearing and controlling enough for THREE invisible fathers, why the hell did I need another one?

Angrillori

My breaking point was fairly simple:

Some dude was made out to be the 'smartest guy in the whole CoC'
then he came to speak to us.
(I'm a microbiology/history major mind you.)
He set up his powerpoint display, his table, got all ready, then turned on the projector to a slide of: a bombardier beetle and proceeded to lie to the whole church about what evolution was, and how the bombardier beetle 'disproved' it.

I was spitting mad. It was that moment I knew that if a so-called christian would lie to us about that, what else would he lie about? And furthermore, what else had all these so-called christians lied about?