Why I'm Agnostic.

Today's blog is about why I'm agnostic. This isn't a blog to make people become agnostic or to put people down who believe in religion. It is simply to tell my story and how I got here and why I think the way I do.

I was raised Lutheran. We only went to church on holidays so religion was not a big part of my life, but it was present somewhat. I also went through Sunday school, and confirmation. I hated confirmation. In high school I was somewhat popular, if not in the A crowd, definitely in the B crowd. And then I went to confirmation and I was a loner. The church my parents picked was not the one in our town but in the town one over, so there was no one there from my school. That is where I got my first taste of bullying, and feeling alone. (at church, nice). Yeah I hated it. Did I mention that? I hated the stupid long hours and it was so boring. I hated the weekend retreats where I got to eat lunch alone and sit alone and talk to no one. Yeah, real fun. Feeling alone like that was something I was not used to. It made me feel bad for the kids in my own school who didn't have friends.

So anyway, I grew up and went to college and got married, etc. I didn't think much of religion. It was there and I would go to church with my family on holidays but other than that it wasn't really in my life. Then, after college I got a job at a Catholic Church as the administrative/creative assistant. This is where I learned to really despise religion and all that it stood for. I remember an early conversation I had with the Confirmation instructor. He asked what religion I was and I said, "I don't know. I guess I was raised Lutheran but I don't think much about religion." He then went on and on to put Catholicism on a pedestal.  I asked him why he was Catholic and he told me he was raised Catholic. I said, "So, what if you were raised Buddhist? Would you be that? What if you were raised Jewish? Would you be that?" He just looked at me oddly and said, "Isn't it better to believe SOMETHING, than NOTHING?" That is when I really started to think. He was just going down the path that his parents told him to. That is when I decided I was not Lutheran but didn't really know what I was.

On 9/11 (Sept. 11, 2001) I really got a bad taste in my mouth for religion. Not only was there the fact that the terrorists attacked our country and it all came back to THEIR religion and beliefs and killing 3,000 innocent Americans to prove their point, but it also hit very close to home. The priest in our church that I worked for was not exactly a "priestly" person. He loved Neil Diamond. He had 3 houses and 7 cars. He called people "fat pigs" and "annoying" when they would walk away from him (and laugh about it). He was all in all, a "yucky" human being. And he was the PRIEST. Nearly all of the people that worked for him and worshipped with him looked up to him as if he was SAINTLY. I saw the other side of him. The ugly side of him.

On 9/11 I saw a VERY ugly side to him. It was such a helpless angry filled emotional day for everyone. No one understood what had just happened. We all walked around empty inside wondering why this was happening. Outside the church a line slowly grew of people wanting to talk to the priest. People wanting some understanding of this horrible event, just wanting someone to talk to that they trusted and that they thought would make them feel better. Granted I think this is silly to come to a priest for this but that's what they did. And do you know what he told me to tell them? "Go tell them I'm in a meeting." OMG. So that's what I had to do. I had to go tell this line of people who were crying and I was on the verge of tears myself, that the preist could not talk to him. He was busy. He was in a MEETING.

Yes, that was the day that I threw in the towel. I decided religion was not for me. That "preist" ended up getting "transferred" a few years after I stopped working there. And it is all so "cliche." Someone found "gay porn" on his computer. So they "transferred" him. Lovely. Problem solved. TRANSFERRED! Next? OMG. Never do they think, maybe this man really is gay and he is so ashamed of it, was raised to believe it was so awful that he decided to become a preist rather than face his sexuality. No that is not even once considered. It is also not normal for someone to have to be forced to be celibate, when sexuality is in our nature. Perhaps this is where the pedophilia comes in to play. I won't even go down this road.

So anyway, I went from working at this church where so many of the "Catholics" were back stabbers and judgmental and really not very nice people, to my next job which was as a graphic designer at a Gay Magazine (quite a switch eh?). Strangely enough, everyone was very open and non-judgmental at the gay magazine. The atmosphere was so different. It was unbelievable. And, it shouldn't have been that way. Aren't the religious people the ones who are supposed to be so loving and open and forgiving? It appears that, in many instances, that is not the case and really quite opposite from it.

I now consider myself Agnostic and have for some time. I am a little jealous of my kids who get to grow up without a religion. They don't have to go through Sunday School or confirmation. I don't put down religion and if they ever choose to go down that road, I will support them. But I want them to decide. For now I do tell them there is a heaven and a God because that is what most of their friends tell them. It gives them peace fore now.

The definition of Agnostic is the view that the truth value of certain claims—especially claims about the existence or non-existence of any deity, but also other religious and metaphysical claims—is unknown or unknowable.^[ Basically I don't know if there is a god. There may be and maybe there isn't but there is no way to know that. I can understand Atheism as well because it is very possible there is no god, no heaven, no nothing - just evolution. But I hold out hope that there is SOMETHING in the after life and that is why I'm not an Atheist. I believe in spirits and ghosts and an afterlife and that is why I am not Atheist. But I don't know if I'm right. I never claim that I am. This is, after all, JUST ME.