Post by yeshuapantera on Feb 24, 2019 16:35:44 GMT
I come from a long line of seventh day adventist's, tracing back to William Miller of the millerite movement in the mid 1800's. So I was born into the denomination and simply accepted that my parents, teachers and pastors, and community all knew what they were talking about and had done of all of the leg work to firmly establish the "absolute truth" that they were claiming to have. I simply took it all at face value as a child. I was raised to believe that our denomination, in particular, had discovered more about the devil's great deception over the world, which, included deceiving the roman catholics into worshiping the "sun," on the "suns day." A deception which then ran into the protestant reformation unchecked, even though the protests knew that the catholic church had adopted various paganism. Until, finally, around the mid 1800's, when my ancestors left methodist and other denominations to become millerites, and then seventh day adventist's following the great disappointment of the millerite movement. When the 2nd coming didn't happen in 1843, or 1844, new apologetic's were created and the seventh day adventist church sprang fourth from that apologetic venture. And the main line of thinking is that the SDA church IS the "remnant of Israel," described in revelation.
By age 12, I was seeing a lot of inconsistencies coming from church members, preachers, and the leadership all the way around. I began having a lot of questions. And I backed out of the youth group activities, like the SDA version of boy scouts (pathfinders). But I still generally believed in god and that the church was the remnant of Israel as they claim. I just thought that a lot of the members were off in their own directions and blamed the questioning more on them personally, not the denomination, not the bible, and certainly not god.
But by age 15, I was questioning a lot more and becoming very skeptical and critical of the whole thing. I suppose I hit an 'age of reason' where I began noticing the poor arguments in favor of the existence of god, and then began to question the whole thing from the top down. And I just sort of realized that none of this was very different than growing up and understanding that santa claus isn't real, basically. It just became too glaringly obvious to deny or ignore any longer.
And I was lucky to have been able to realize this on my own at a young age. A lot of people didn't realize so soon, and worse, a lot of people grew up and then got suckered into the churches as adults. But I was also unlucky that these realizations came my freshman year of christian boarding school, while away from home living a dorm for the next four years, and under the direction and control of the SDA church organization. That led to much turmoil when I began to openly question the church and school leadership and challenge their beliefs and authority. But I was stubborn about facing off with leaders and members who claimed "absolute truth" with no credible evidence behind them to support the claims. It just rubbed me the wrong way. And I didn't want to allow these spurious claims to go unchecked. I made a lot of enemies at the top, basically.
I never really got around to doing anything more than rebelling against the system and living outside of it until around age 25, when another big wave of reason hit me along with the developmental stage of the frontal lobe cortex, as it turns out. I went from pretty much hating reading, to reading all the time and digesting as much information as I could get my hands on. I went back and reread the bible. I started noticing every contradiction and problem along the way. Then I went on to personally research my way through comparative world mythology and religion, reading everything available from Joseph Campbell and a good deal of Alan Watts. Then I turned my attention to archaeology and biblical critical analysis. With a strong dose of scientific reading because I was raised as a young earth creationist with very little exposure or real understanding of the BBT, geology or biology for that matter. I poured over every intellectual interest that caught my attention. Then I read the mythicist literature and became active with some of the mythicist book authors.
And to be honest, given enough time I slowed down after spanning such a wide range of knowledge and information, but it's never stopped. Nor would I expect it to ever stop. I simply changed course in life and became open to learning new information, adjusting my ways and opinions accordingly due to encountering new information, and committing to a life of truth seeking going forward. So I try and lend a hand where ever I can when it comes to going through the stages of deconversion. I picked up a lot of information during the last 30 years or so of being deconverted. And have gathered a good deal of experience dealing with apologists.
By age 12, I was seeing a lot of inconsistencies coming from church members, preachers, and the leadership all the way around. I began having a lot of questions. And I backed out of the youth group activities, like the SDA version of boy scouts (pathfinders). But I still generally believed in god and that the church was the remnant of Israel as they claim. I just thought that a lot of the members were off in their own directions and blamed the questioning more on them personally, not the denomination, not the bible, and certainly not god.
But by age 15, I was questioning a lot more and becoming very skeptical and critical of the whole thing. I suppose I hit an 'age of reason' where I began noticing the poor arguments in favor of the existence of god, and then began to question the whole thing from the top down. And I just sort of realized that none of this was very different than growing up and understanding that santa claus isn't real, basically. It just became too glaringly obvious to deny or ignore any longer.
And I was lucky to have been able to realize this on my own at a young age. A lot of people didn't realize so soon, and worse, a lot of people grew up and then got suckered into the churches as adults. But I was also unlucky that these realizations came my freshman year of christian boarding school, while away from home living a dorm for the next four years, and under the direction and control of the SDA church organization. That led to much turmoil when I began to openly question the church and school leadership and challenge their beliefs and authority. But I was stubborn about facing off with leaders and members who claimed "absolute truth" with no credible evidence behind them to support the claims. It just rubbed me the wrong way. And I didn't want to allow these spurious claims to go unchecked. I made a lot of enemies at the top, basically.
I never really got around to doing anything more than rebelling against the system and living outside of it until around age 25, when another big wave of reason hit me along with the developmental stage of the frontal lobe cortex, as it turns out. I went from pretty much hating reading, to reading all the time and digesting as much information as I could get my hands on. I went back and reread the bible. I started noticing every contradiction and problem along the way. Then I went on to personally research my way through comparative world mythology and religion, reading everything available from Joseph Campbell and a good deal of Alan Watts. Then I turned my attention to archaeology and biblical critical analysis. With a strong dose of scientific reading because I was raised as a young earth creationist with very little exposure or real understanding of the BBT, geology or biology for that matter. I poured over every intellectual interest that caught my attention. Then I read the mythicist literature and became active with some of the mythicist book authors.
And to be honest, given enough time I slowed down after spanning such a wide range of knowledge and information, but it's never stopped. Nor would I expect it to ever stop. I simply changed course in life and became open to learning new information, adjusting my ways and opinions accordingly due to encountering new information, and committing to a life of truth seeking going forward. So I try and lend a hand where ever I can when it comes to going through the stages of deconversion. I picked up a lot of information during the last 30 years or so of being deconverted. And have gathered a good deal of experience dealing with apologists.