Atheists: Did you go straight from not believing in the bible to being an atheist?

I was born an atheist and never saw a reason to change...

I was seven when I first heard about that 'god' thingie.

I immediately put god into the same box as elf and pixie...

I mean, it was just so obvious... the whole lack of evidence thingie, a?

However...

For the next 40+ years I tried every way I could to prove that seven year old wrong...

I wanted to believe – I WANTED a god to exist – I wanted to be like other people.

Of course I failed to prove the god thingie exists because god is imaginary...

I'll guarantee the number of xians who have challenged their beliefs similarly is small.

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I'm what you call "on the fence" about whether God really exists or not because I really don't know what to believe because I (as well as the rest of the world) do not have any facts. How can i believe 100% that God is real when I have ZERO proof.. On the contrary how can I believe for a fact that he doesn't exists when I have ZERO proof of that either.. We just don't know anything about the afterlife.. We have opinions based on a book.. that to me isn't a reason to "believe"..

Believing something exists is a tricky subject.. Christians will always tell you that it's a choice.. What you believe is a choice.. This is so inaccurate.. Think about it.. Could you "choose" to sincerely believe that dogs can fly? probably not because you are NOT convinced.. One has to become convinced before they are able to believe something to be true. We cannot choose what convinces us.

My Dad is a pastor and I grew up in a Christian home and defined myself as a Christian but I never really fully understood everything the Bible said.. I always had my doubts and it wasn't until i got much older and wiser that I started using critical and logical thinking.. I'm not saying I do NOT believe God exists, I'm saying that I just don't know.. because we have no facts.

Choosing to acknowledge and verbally say "this is what I believe" is NOT the same as choosing that belief. People often mistake aknowledging a belief for choosing that belief. Saying "I believe this" is not the same as choosing that particular belief to begin with.

If you happen to be convinced of something, that would mean you had NO choice but to actually believe it!!

Anyway, there is a LOT more to atheism than Christians think.. People don't "choose" atheism.. instead, it's the only logical option for them from the evidence (or lack of) provided.. Christians will never understand this though. If the Bible said 2+2 was 6, they would believe it and when you doubted it, they would quote the Bible..

My transition from Christianity to atheism took somewhere around two years.

It started when I began to question my beliefs and do online research. I was around 16. I went from Christian, to non-religious theist, to deist, to agnostic, to agnostic atheist, when I was 18 or so. Now I'm almost 21.

That's how it goes for a lot of atheists I've talked to. Of course, that was a very simplified answer. My deconversion had a lot more to it, but it would take forever to type out the whole story.

Basically, yes. Well... no... sorta.

I didn't really know the bible very well to begin with. I was born atheist, then learned of god in Sunday school, then forgot about god in kindergarten, then was reminded later on about burning in hell and all that, so I tried on belief for a while, then I turned 13, and realized it's all a big load o' hooey.

I stopped believing in God when I was 16 when I realized that most organized religions are pyramid schemes. The pastor would scream and yell about offerings because the lights were about to be shut off yet he and his wife were driving a Mercedes and a BMW. I also find it funny that all the girls who were so religious and speaking tongues and all that other crap ended up being unwed teenage mothers. I on the other hand who has never heard the "voice" of God has no children and not living paycheck to paycheck.

As a kid I did wonder if God existed, but that wonder disappeared the same time I stopped believing in Santa around age 6.

No. I was raised Southern Baptist. I left Christianity, became a Deist for about 6 years (give or take), then an agnostic for about 5, flirted with Pantheism, but decided to be an agnostic atheist. So it took awhile in my case.

I had to stop believing in a deist god before I called myself an atheist. That took about 1 week. There are plenty of arguments against deism.

It took me a few months of being a deist and then pantheist before I admitted to myself that I was an atheist. First I realized I could not justify my religion as being true, and then the classic theist arguments fell one by one in my mind as I admitted where they were flawed.

There was an attempt to bring me up Catholic, but I can't remember a day when I didn't think it was all fairy stories. I wasn't shy about it either. It was a proud day all around when I was unexpectedly graduated from the 5th grade in my Catholic school directly to the 7th in a public school missing my 6th grade Confirmation.