In previous blogs I’ve talked about questions and feeling
I’ve had about today’s world. However in this blog I’ll answer why I get to
sleep in on Sunday.
For me I wasn’t
raised as an Atheist, at a young age I didn’t get the option of either choosing
to believe or not to believe. I remember
a time where every school holidays I would visit my grandparents on my mother’s
side and every Sunday I’d go to church with my grandmother. I don’t remember
much of those days; I think I was too young but when something such as faith is
drilled into you at such a young age from people you know and trust, it’s hard
not to accept it as fact, as a 4 or 5 year old I really couldn’t tell the
difference. Thinking about it I’d
probably still believe if it weren’t for a few key defining moments in my life.
At age 7 I lost my younger brother, only a month and a half
old when he passed. I would have to say if however there was a key point, the
first domino to fall this would be it. My brother’s death as a child hit me
incredibly hard, even today I still feel the gravity of it all. I’d say the
greatest impact of his death was not the years of depression that followed for
me, but instead I learned at a very young age to be cynical. At age 7 the world
was not a place of wonder any more, the magic in my eye’s no longer existed. I
guess I saw the world through much more mature eyes at a very young age, I
didn’t climb tree’s because I knew I could fall and hurt myself, in later life
I found I’d even keep those close to me as far away as possible to myself, so
it would hurt less when the inevitable occurred and I would lose them. It
wasn’t until much recently when I opened my self-up to the world that I think I
changed again. Today I see myself as not as a cynic, but much more of a
realist. I am very optimistic about experiences in life such as love, because I
have experienced them; however I retain my cynicism for things I don’t
experience, for things that I don’t feel, namely Religion. Now my Brother’s death was not the only thing
that caused my not to believe, despite my new found cynicism I still believed
because I accepted religion as fact.
Domino two in my tale of late Sunday mornings comes from my
father. I think around age 9 or 10 I remember play fighting with my old man,
the memory seems so distant to me now, and I no longer remember how the
conversation arose but somehow, and one of the most important and life changing
things was said to me that day. My Dad said that he didn’t believe in god, I’d
like to ad that I didn’t become an Atheist because I thought it was cool, or
following in my father’s ideals, but that day was so important to me because
for the first time I had choice. I had the choice wether to believe in
something or not. Previous to this day I had no choice in it all, I had 9 years
of religion convinced into me by my family. Not only was this day I guess part
two of me becoming an Atheist, it also made me who I am as a person. In choice
I question everything around me, I choose my life, I don’t follow what the
majority want, I follow what I want. Personally I see religion as so prevalent
because choice is not an option given to children. With choice and cynicism I
didn’t know what to believe however, I was 2 pieces of a 3 piece puzzle, it
wasn’t until I got a little older and a little smarter that my eyes were
finally opened to the world of science.
I think everyone ask’s the question why am I here. How does
the world around me exist, and to be honest it’s a pretty big question, one
that religion has a pretty simple explanation for, which I can see as a part of
the appeal as God did it all and you don’t need to worry any more than
that. To me even at the age on 10-11
that seem for my mind to convenient of a story, that the explanation of
everything was just ‘Some divine being felt like creating life so he or she
just snapped their fingers and everything was great’. We all have beliefs me, I believe that
science offers explanations for those questions we label as ‘one of life’s
great mysteries’, Now Im not going to go
on about how I think my beliefs are right. But I believe in what science has to
prove because unlike religion It attempts to back up what it says with evidence, repeatability
and has the capacity to admit it’s wrong . I think we all believe something whether
it be science, religion or just that I need to eat in order to survive, and I
can assume for many people even atheists our beliefs are different, And I encourage
people to believe what they want. However to me Science is the 3rd
and final piece to my Atheist puzzle.
While writing this piece I thought in summary why I can
sleep in Sunday can be put in terms of maths. Cynicism + Choice + Science = My
Atheism. Sorry for the long read but it was a pretty long story.
